Viva La Guild Life
by 2ndhandsmoke
Summary: The 6/6/06 event...The Falador Massacre. Follow three guild operatives in search of answers for reasons behind that day. rated M for bloody battle scenes, and tangy citrus scenes...along with swearing, alcohol, and tobacco refrences. Runescape isn't mine.
1. Enter Red Hawk

i don't own runescape, but i do own almost all the people i made in here...well their personalities anyway.

chapter 1: Enter red Hawk

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"AHHHHH!!!"

"RUN!!!"

Three highway men had just successfully robbed another pair of travelers on their way from lumbridge to falador. That was their fourth in an hour, and they felt like they were on fire. One noticed something out the corner of his eye...two men...beige...cloaked men? You don't get those looks in this region often.

"More travelers!" he hissed at his leader and fellow grunt

"Back to the hiding spots boys, this will be our ALL TIME RECORD-" his two lackey's winced, remembering they'd tried once before and failed miserably."- of most thefts in a day and i do NOT want this going wrong!" he said in a hushed, aggrivated tone remembering how they had been cause for failure nine times out of ten.

The two traveling men just made it to the path's intersection when the highway men jumped out and gave their famous line.

"Stand and deliv-HUH?!"

"Stand and delive-HARRY!"

"stand and de-UUUUAAAHHH!!"

The taller of the two travelers had turned and ran "harry" through with a long two-handed sword. From the looks of it, he got him in the heart. Had he not screamed, the other two would have doubted he felt it at all. One bandit noticed the smaller man had still not turned around. It accually looked like he was fiddling with something, but from his angle he couldn't tell.

"BASTARDS!!!" The highway grunt yelled as he ran at the still turned around man, arms raised prepared to chop him in two. The long bladed man did nothing but watch, allowing his earth brown eyes to be visible and showing quite alot of amusement.

"**SUMMONING: SPIRIT SCORPION**...**POISON SHOT!**" The smaller man's voice rose with every word.

The once running thief had made it within two feet of the man before he felt heat in his chest. He looked down to see he had ran into a tail of some sort and now had a stinger in his chest. He looked at the smaller man, laughed, pulled the stinger out and poised to strike again when he droped to his knees, suddenly screaming in agony.

"AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" He began frantically ripping through his shirt to see that the stinger's poison had melted a hole in his chest. The hole got to be about three inches below neck before his screams turned to gurgles and finally silence. Ironically he was still alive, as the poison only ate through his esophagus so far. That was a good sign, as the heart was next in line. He'd have five more seconds tops before the poison would begin to eat away at his heart.

The highway leader looked at the two corpses, then at the beige cloaked men, and back at the bodies. He took one last glance at the travelers who had now...removed their hoods?

The taller man, blood still dripping from his blade, turned to look at the leader. His earth eyes still had that twinkle of amusement. If there were no whites, his eyes would have blended in with his dark skin.

Had the leader not 'soiled' himself in fear, he would have laughed at the way the man's sharp white hair dropped down a bit to frame his face causing a major contrast. The man looked back at his partner who was currently digging through his pack, his scorpion quickly piling the things he threw next to him.

Suddenly the smaller tan skinned man with the grey skull cap on stood up, shouting "found it!" and ran over to the earthen eyed man who had gone back to staring down the highway leader. He quickly opened up a file and handed it to the taller man, who began to read as the summoner replaced all the things he had taken out.

"Jeof...highway man...your success rate is sub-par, which leads me to question the death toll on your records. However, no explanation is needed. The kingdom of misthalin has deemed you guilty. Your punishment is death." finished the dark man in a tone that suggested it was 'just business'.

Jeof's eyes grew wide, He knew his death was coming from day one, seeing as that was the penelty for murder. If only he had known what looking into the eyes of your killer was like, he'd have never started a "highway man's" life in the first place. He briefly wondered if this was what his victims felt like. He watched the dark man's eyes turn from brown to white. He knew his death would be from magic now...he closed his eyes tight as he waited.

'Great, and by magic no less. I heard the pain of some magics can be worse than death itself...please just do it quickly.' the leader thought as he quietly waited.

After about another thirty seconds of waiting, he finally worked up the courage to peep though one eye. He looked up and saw two arrows sticking out of the tall man's shoulder, who had now turned away to face what now had his attention.

Looking past the man, the leader saw a blonde, pony-tailed girl in a red vest and chaps with what appeared to be golden colored hawk eyes knocking back another arrow. She let loose at the tall man again, but the smaller man's scorpion moved to deflect the arrow. eventually locrusilas stood next to him and began deflecting the small flurry of arrows the woman was creating.

The smaller man, who the highway leader assumed was ink, was appearing to have trouble dodging the arrows while maintaining contact with the scorpion, so he dismissed it. However, Even with the strain of summoning gone he still wasn't agile enough. He took a group of 3 arrows to the thigh before yelling in pain and falling over.

The large man, or locrusilas the leader guessed, was fine however. The arrows were pinging off of his body whenever they had managed to slip past his sword. This caused confusion for the highway leader as the two arrows shot earlier got him in the shoulder, but now none were hitting. On closer inspection he noticed locrusilas' lips moving as if chanting.

'prayer...' Thought the leader to himself as more arrows whizzed pass him.

Finally the arrows stopped and Ink looked the worse for wear. He rolled on his side, took something out of his pack and slammed it on the ground. A floating jelly fish type creature poofed into existence and immeadiatly began glowing light blue.

After a small moment Ink stood up and the arrows fell out of his leg. The holes where they pierced were healing up, leaving scars and red marks in their place

"Stupid bitch, always following us with attempts to kill us..." He muttered to himself. Locrusilas nodded his agreement.

"I'M AM NOT A GOD-DAMNED PIN CUSHIN YOU DUMB BROAD!" he yelled and quickly dismissed the jelly fish familar he'd summoned before, only to pull out yet another pouch, kneel down and slam it onto the ground. A large minotaur with a giant dark blue battle axe and armor poofed in front of Ink and stood in a defensive stance. Both feeling the angry vibes pulsing from the blonde.

She shot off another arrow, this one glowing and flying a bit faster, favoring silence as she continued her attempts to land a hit and end the pair.

The large minotaur blocked the arrow with its human sized battle axe and Ink looked just in time to catch her darting off into the forest "Loc, take care of the highway leader, i'ma go get that bitch." He spat, the bandit mentally laughed at himself for getting the names right.

"Right, don't die following her. Remember...she's got the ra-" he began

"The range advantage, believe me i know." he unsheathed a red dagger and took off, the minotaur not far behind.

"now then, that leaves the question of what to do with you...ah yes, death." locrusilas smiled when the bandit opened his mouth but shut it when he saw his hands glow. it was at this point the leader decided he had enough and booked.

"you'll like this, a...friend taught me how to do it." he shot an arm forward.

"**BLOODY SNARE**" he yelled as vines with long sharp thorns rose up and wrapped themselves around the running man. He tripped and more vined covered in the same thorns shot up from the ground and slammed themselves across the man's back, causing him to scream bloody murder as more razor sharp thorns pierced the areas in between his spinal disks and some even between his ribs. As if that wasn't enough, more and more vines kept adding to the pile, but it was so thick they were not even able to reach the man with their spikes.

"Consider that your jail for the next five minutes of your life...if you live that long." He he kept a straight face now.

It was true, the leader was bleeding out from the thorns and he knew it. As they began to squeeze tighter the leader felt an even sharper pain than before as his once whole ribs had turned broken and began piercing his lung alongside the thorns, which were now growing in length. His eyes rolled back and he began to cough up massive amounts of blood.

With most of his internal body organs skewered from the huge thorns, he died after convulsing from lack of oxygen due to punctured lungs.

Locrusilas didn't even bother to look back as he sped away after his possible pin cushin partner.

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The blonde had ran pretty far into draynor's forest. When she had first started, the sun was just begining to set, and now it was dark. She had numerous cuts and scrapes from all the loose branches she'd run into, and her eyes hurt for maintaining her hawk eyes for so long.

"RRRGGGHHHH!! Why can't they just die like normal people!?!? They always messed things up for me before-" She began to rant. "-and now this! The one that **I** shot is actually up and chasing me!" She frowned as she recalled her one hundred percent hit ratio with her hawk eyes back in her training days.

"of course, that was back the-OOF!" She was cut short as she tripped over a root that decided to stick out just a little too far.

"owwww..." She grumbled as she pulled herself to her feet and dusted off. She was about to bend over to pick back up her bow when she heard the last thing she wanted to hear right now.

"**STEEL BULL RUSH!"**

The archer stepped back, or rather stumbled and fell, just in the nick of time to avoid Ink and his minotaur slashing at her simultaneously, the former having sprung above the latter in a leaping motion to cut whatever stood in his and/or his bull's path...He was an empath after all. If the animal wanted it, chances with ink were they got it.

She hit the ground and immeadiatly rolled to the side to avoid the giant battle axe meant for her head. she had no time to rest as ink followed up the attack with a swift kick to the face that knocked her down as she rolled to get up. Still, she knew with it being two to one she'd have no time to relax and rolled herself backwards and narrowly avoided having her head smashed by the bull's giant hoof.

Now that she accually had some distance, she reached behind her and grabbed an arrow only to remember she had to leave the bow if she wanted to keep her pretty head on her shoulders. Both parties paused, Ink fearing the fact that there was distance, the blonde fearing the fact that she had nothing to shoot with.

There was a small stare down. Neither moved an inch, not wanting to set off the other in a frenzy of attacks.

The archer was currently trying to come up with a plan to pick up the fallen bow without losing any limbs. Her brows furred as every solution turned out to be a run-in-and-hope-for-the-best kind of deal. She couln't have that one hit with Ink.

'sure, shrugging off pain is no big deal, but the minotaur would definatly break something or plain chop me in two, and im absoloutly sure ink's dagger is poisoned with the same venom he's used on the highway man earler...it's funny though...he looks like he's really out of it...' she began to trail off in thought when her eyes widened in surprise.

Ink on the other hand was having a nervous breakdown. he wasn't supplied with any ranged weapons for the simple task of highway man extermination, especially being paired with his childhood friend locrusilas.

'I should really try for a law suit if i make it back alive' he mentally chuckled at the dark thought. he didn't have the luxury of being blessed like locrusilas ....nor did he notice that the girl was missing her bow. Almost all of his concentration was being put into the minotaur protecting him from any attacks sent his way. He was about to dismiss the minotaur and run in when the strangest thought ran through his mind. Sis jaw dropped slighty and he mentally slapped himself for not noticing it sooner.

"YOU'RE MISSING YOUR BOW!!!" Ink bellowed out almost accusasively

"YOU CAN BARELY CONCENTRATE WHEN YOU SUMMON, HUH?!" The would be assassin practically screamed in a teasing voice.

Both had been taken aback by the others comment, but only ink was still grinning like a champion.

"you forget though, idiot-" he began and the blonde felt a change in the air...almost like static "-my familar is my WEAPON, and thats more i can say for you...." the minotaur began charging almost as soon as he had finished the sentence. its once dark axe was now gaining a slightly transparent blue aura over the head and occasionaly a spark would hop from one spot to the next.

Ink held out a closed fist, glowing the same color as the axe. He closed his eyes and the bulls once black eyes lightened up to a tanish brown. It's axe began to float above its head as the blue left Ink's hand and jumped onto the axe, and then began to become a focus point for a softball sized lightning ball.

Both fighters stood for a moment, Ink focusing on completing the electrified ball, and the blonde wondering if now was the time to make the dash for her bow.

The orb disappeared for a moment, and the blonde figured that was her que to run for the bow.

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Locrusilas must have been searching for ink for about 30 minutes now. He had been running before, but once nightfall came he decided to slow down to a walk.

"Yo! Ink!" he pointlessly hollered out for what seemed to be the thousandth time now. he was thinking about saying 'screw it' and calling one of those new "rescue teams" he'd been hearing about so much lately. He silently damned the fact they didn't exist when he first began the life of a scaper.

'Nooooooooooooooooo, we had to learn survival the hard way..." He remembered the falador massacre that'd happened when he was a child...that alone was enough to put a grimmace on his face

------flashback------

_blood. fire. limbs. loot._

_locrusilas had been running through the falador slums, trying to outrun the murderers that'd been chasing him. they'd caught him twice now, only for him to escape at the last moment. needless to say his pursuers had been pretty pissed by now, and were launching everything they had. the young loc had at least four knives sticking out of his back, and numerous gashes where arrow and darts had gazed him. he was begining to feel woozy and was sure the projectiles had some poison on them._

_yeah, he was scared. his head hurt, stomach churned, and his lungs burned. but the thing he was worried the most about the most was the illness that was still eating away at his very life._

_(further flashback)_

_he had run out of medicine before the rampage began, and his mentor had stepped out to retrieve it. he SHOULD have been with his parents, but they were killed by trolls during the small battle at death plateau. they'd mentioned in their will that loc be given to his mentor, who would only answer to kat, to be watched over._

_before his mentor made it back, the slaughter had begun, and loc's body was now trembling due to his sickness._

_'the apothecary was only down the alleyway a little bit, im sure if i run fast enough i can make it.' he tried to boost his confidence, but as the thought ended another cannon fired and he cried out as it blasted throught the small shack's wall._

_deciding it was not safe to stay in one spot for long, he grabbed the child sized bronze 2h his mentor gave him to train with and dashed out the door._

_that was when the saveges took notice of him and began to follow._

_(end futher flashback)_

_now he was at a dead end. litterally. he had nowhere to go and the attackers were closing in. he quickly unsheathed the 2h from his back, but the illness had made his body too weak to hold it properly and he droped it._

_he knelt down and fell into a violent coughing fit, coughing up drops of blood. his would be killers were advancing on him. he began to fade to black and the last thing he saw before he passed out was a white wolf howling out a whirlwind that blew the attackers back and into a wall._

---end flashback---

He chuckled as he remembered when he first learned that ink had been his saving grace that day.

'I still can't remember how I0 ended up alive though...' he though. true to word, the illness should have taked him, but the next day he woke up in a local hospital set up just outside of falador. the one inside the city appearantly was too gruesome and wrecked at the moment for anyone to want to look at it.

'but enough memories, the sooner i find ink, the sooner we leave. faster leaving equals longer drinking time at home, and thats an equation i can get down with.' he thought with mild amusement

"INK!!!" he called out again for the ump-teenth time.

he inhaled deeply and was about to yell out again when he heard the sound of arrows 'thunkink' into something and a large electrical pop. to his excitement and sorrow he recognized both sounds.

"IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINK!!!!" he hurriedly dashed off again for his friend, praying to any god he could recall.

-------------------end chapter---------------------

so? how was it? gimme reviews. i got the story pretty planned out, and i think you will like the way i take it. it does calm down soon for a few chapters but i promise you the action comes back full force. a cookie for the person who can tell me what summon ink used. :D


	2. Damn the empaths!

(ok, just for the record, and to make it easier for the people that can't catch the subtle hints i might put in the story later, im gonna say fuck it and make it easier on the readers and myself.

ink splat- age:22 - druid and empath; ink swears like a sailor and insults someone at every chance he gets...but deep down the man would risk his life for anything that might get him closer to his ultimate achievement, unknown even to his partner... his extensive arsenal of summons combined with his training with daggers make's for a devastating one-two punch combo.

locrusilas- age:25 -pronounced:low-krew-sa-lis - the elegant, if not sloppy and forgetful at times, suit-preferring leader of the sector himself and ink are in. able to slice multiple foes in a single swipe of his crimson colored two handed sword. any enemy to far away for his sword to cut gets blasted with the dark skinned man's powerful magics.

cally beur- age:21- pronounced:cal-e b-yur- the crimson hawk, as she was called during her days training with the archers of lumbride, enters with a bow and a quiver packed with arrows ready to turn her next target into a pin-cushion...what seems to be her obsession with shooting at ink and locrusilas.

now, without further ado...)

chapter 2: Damn the Empaths!

----------last time-----------

__

Ink held out a closed fist, glowing the same color as the axe. He closed his eyes and the bulls once black eyes lightened up to a tanish brown. it's axe began to float above its head as the blue left Ink's hand and jumped onto the axe, and then began to become a focus point for a softball sized lightning ball.

both fighters stood for a moment, ink focusing on completing the electrified ball, and the blonde wondering if now was the time to make the dash for her bow.

the orb disappeared for a moment, and medsa figured that was her que to run for the bow.

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the blonde made a mad dash fueled by adrenaline and fear for her bow. she was within 3 feet when she leaped and rolled to avoid any oncoming projectile ink may have fired while she was running. with practiced ease she rolled up on one knee in an aiming position and fired as fast as she could. her training made sure she'd fire, but nothing could prepare her for what she was about to see or feel coming at her when she looked up from firing her arrow.

ink had known his attack would take a small while to charge, and he'd hoped his speech would have stunned her longer than it had, but it looks like she'd saw the focal point of the attack and took that time to get her bow and fire. the arrow caught ink in the stomach and he regretted using his void spinner to heal earlier. he was low on summoning energy and he could feel his grasp on the familar waning. he fired the minotaurs blast at the blonde girl who was accually begining to become an annoyance.

the blast caught her in the shoulder and she howled out as the electrified blast spread over her body and electrouced her. she feel back and began convulsing. a small moment of this and it stopped. she lay on the ground still consious huffing from the pain she'd endured. she made to lift herself forward and grunted in agggrivation when she realised ink's attack had stunned her. ink began stumbling toward her with a red potion, a smaller green potion, and a twig in his hands.

ink knelt down as best as he could with the arrow still lodged in his stomach. he set the objects down on the ground, gripped the arrow, and yanked it out giving a long "ooowwww" as he pulled it out. he hastily opened the small green potion and applied the green potion to the outside of the wound which slowly stopped bleeding. next, he opened the red bottle and opened the woman's mouth. she'd have resisted if he hadn't paralyzed her with that damned minotaur of his...'wait, where did that thing go anyway' she'd wondered. she'd have looked around, but again the summoning bastard had ruined that for her.

ink took the twig and dipped it in the red potion. when he pulled it out, he made sure he had a decent drop on the end before he held it over her mouth and let it drip. he closed her mouth waited. she blinked several times before opening her mouth to speak before ink covered it with his hand.

"listen and listen good..." he spoke in a quick, serious tone. "...that shock i gave you completely paralyzed your muscles. unless i do something quick, you'll be that way from now until you figure out how to off yourself, and we wouldn't want that would we?" her pupils shrank in fear as she realized that chasing ink and locrusilas was something she never should have done in the first place.

"now, that drop i made you swallow was a restore potion." he waved the red potion in front of her eyes. "this is your "saving grace" we'll say for lack of better words. i gave you enough to blink, talk, maybe move your head." she tested his words by blinking and moving her mouth, but her head was stuck. "what, can't move your head? hah, sucks to be you" he laughed "anyway, as i was saying...you'll be paralyzed unless i give you more of this. however it's not leaving my grasp anytime soon. nah, you're gonna have to do something for me first." she inhaled sharply as mental images filled her head as what the possibly perverted druid could have wanted.

ink heard her inhale and watched her eyes close like she was scared. THEN he realized what she was thinking he wanted. "WOAH THERE! im not exacly after that... i mean, don't get me wrong. that ponytail you got goin' would be somethin to grab..." the paralyzed blonde felt her face get warm with embarrassment and anger. "...but im not exacly after that. maybe my partner locrusilas would be huntin for that, but all i want are answers...now, question one...who are you?" he asked calmly as he pulled his hand away and sat back.

"Cally..." she half-mumbled

"do you have a last name?" he drawled out, still waving the bottle around. it was no longer teasing her in her face, but she knew he shook it to grab her attention.

"...Beur." again with another mumble. ink sighed. he figured that was enough with the basics and decided to get serious.

"why have you been following me and loc around trying to kill us?" his eyes locked with her's.

cally was hesitant to answer, but unless she wanted to be a rag doll for the rest of her life she figured she better speak up. she licked her lips and began. "do you remember the goblin attack on lumbridge?" she asked in a quiet tone

"the one that resulted in the lumbridge drought? yeah, i remember that. what of it?" ink answered with a question of his own. he didn't see what that had to do with her shooting at his friend and him.

"that attack killed my pare...hell,it killed my whole bloody family. i had been stabbed with a spear and left to die..." ink grimmaced "...but a man found me, and he nursed me back to health. his name was sigmund. he adopted me and told me about the goblin attack." ink's heart beat faster remembering the man he and locrusilas faced down. he was an evil man with a hate for all creatures people had dubbed as monsters. ink was begining to connect dots and numerous questions filled his head, but he'd humor her and let her continue. "in the next coming years he rose to be the duke's most important advisor and i was trained in the way of the bow should there ever be another attack or maybe a revolt." she began to tear up at her next words, the venom coating them thicker than that of ink's spirit scorpion. "but then YOU TWO came, and you defended those monsters and lied to the duke about sigmund being involved. it was YOU two who had him killed! i swore revenge after i heard the news. thats why those arrows have "coming out of nowhere" as i remember you once saying" tears were over flowing but she still had enough fight to insult.

ink sighed. he took out a fire rune and a "tobacco stick" as they called them in varrock. he had nothing better to do one day and walked up to the vendor advertising them. he bought a box and was hooked ever since. people hated him for smoking, but what ever he figured. he lit up and took a drag. after exhaling he asked "what all do you know about the goblin attack?" she met his gaze and answered "not much, considering i was so young. i just remember what sigmund told me..." ink laughed and took another drag. he took out a summoning pouch and slammed it on the ground. in it's place was a beaver, which he told to go get some fire wood. after the beaver was gone he responded...

"that old fart was lying. i don't know how but he still IS lying." the girl let out another frustrated grunt at not being able to hit the irritating man. "the goblins never attacked. with my being an empath, and loc's ability to decimate large group of things, we were hired to investigate the hole discovered in lumbridge castle's cellar. we went down and talked. i felt no hateful energy radiating off the goblins. we reported this...and found that sigmund and his cronies were responsible for the attack. he was fired and we were informed he was beheaded. he obviously wasn't thought as soon he tried to drown the goblins and we stopped him a second time. after that he ran and we have no clue where he's at now..." at some point during his revelance, she had began crying again. ink hated making women cry. even tho she tried to kill him and loc multiple times, he still felt bad. so he did the only thing he could think of that might make her stop. he quickly reached for the red vial again and began pouring the liquid in her mouth. slowly she pulled herself up and ink had her down a blue potion to "balance out" the dizzying effects of the restore potion. they sat there in silence, both mulling over what the other had said. finally, cally had spoken up. "all that you said...that was true?" she asked almost fearfully.

"unfortunatly yes...i...apologize-" he seemed to have trouble finding the right words. "-for what you had to put up with."

"but he helped me, helped lumbridge! how could he have plotted something like that! and besides, they're goblins! who needs the-" she was interupted as ink spoke

"i'll remind you i'm empath. i only FEEL what other things FEEL. i FELT the goblins had no murderous intent. i FELT sigmund had a hate for the duke and was looking for a coup de grace via revolt...and right now i FEEL that the only reason you think im still lying is because now you feel like you won't have anything to fight after now...am i right?" he asked, each word soft as not to scare her. ink felt he had an intresting proposition for her.

"you're...*sigh*...you're right...i spent 10 years waiting for the day my adoptive father would give the word, and we would get revenge for all those that were killed...but...now i..." tears began to well up and she began crying again. the beaver came back and ink used the wood it brought along with the fire rune he had to get a soft camp fire going.

"i have a proposal for you, considering you'll shut up long enough for me to talk-" she sent him a death glare but did her best to quiet herself. "-now, i'll have to talk and pull some strings and what not, but i think i can get you a spot on mine and locrusilas' team. ah! before you deny it look at it this way. i FEEL where you're coming from. i won't explain why, but i'll make sure you stay alive long enough to find sigmund. you can have your 10 years back when we find him...and you'll be around people who will watch your back. true, we go on dangerous missions all the time, but i think it'd benifit us both, and once you find sigmund you can sign for retirement from the business and live YOUR life. what do ya say?" he asked. he felt a rejectful vibe at first, but it changed to something more promising as he went on.

"i suppose if you can pull those strings then yes, i'll join your group for the moment being." she answered back, prideful of having dropped in the clan business so easily.

"good. well then i suppose we should either try to find our way out or camp here for the moment. i don't care either way so its up to you." he said stretching and getting ready to get up should he need to.

"i...think we should stay. its the draynor woods and dangerous as it may be, walking around trying to find our way out might make it worse." she shifted he pack off her shoulders and dropped it on the ground to begin searching for her water skins.

"right, i suppose we should hit the sack to leave early enough. if you're serious then we're gonna have to seek a counsil with the guild hq." he sighed...he hated having to talk with those old walking tombstone names. "i would cook some food but i don't think it'd be a good idea to leave each other out here-" he was cut off by a quick yawn accompanied with her rolling out a small sleeping bag and curling up in it.

"...and now i have to take first watch..." his stomach growled. "god dammit. i hope loc finds us soon. this girl is proving to be alot of trouble."

he sat with the company of a dying fire, howling, and worst of all...cally's snoring...

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ink was tired. after about 2 hours of nothing but snores, crickets, and the occasional growl or howl he was begining to go mad. he slapped himself over and over for training to be an empath. he felt her pain and got soft, and now here he was taking "guard" over this makeshift camp they'd set up. he was still low on spiritual energy, and his stomach wound had been giving him cramps for awhile now. on top of all that, his stomach was growling.

"i swear to god if locrusilas doesn't show up soon i'll leave this girl for the wolves." he lied to himself. he took out another tobacco stick and was about to light it when he heard the sound of rustling bushes and trees. he quickly unsheathed the red dagger he had from before and took out a fighting stance.

'damn, this is bad...im not exacly the best with close combat, and with no spiritual energy...dammit' he cursed in his mind as he realized this situation was looking grim.

he was about to yell for cally to get up when the figure he'd been ready to cut stepped into the light of the fire.

"loc?" ink questioned. the figure stepped in to the light more. "it IS you...man, you had me about ready to do some serious stabbage." he ended with a chuckle.

"ha! don't lie to yourself ink! you accually had me worried because i couldn't sense your energy." they shared a laugh. loc noticed something lying on the ground a few feet away.

"what is that supposed to be?" loc asked with a hint of more worry in his voice.

"ah...about that...see, that's that girl thats been shooting at us these past couple of weeks." ink replied and saw locrusilas tense. "before you get ready to lop her head off, i have a proposition..."he trailed off.

"and that would b-" he was cut off when ink spoke

"let her join our team..." ink said smoothly as he often did while trying to convince loc of something.

"wait...after all the attempts on our lives she made, you want to welcome her into our base?! honestly ink, how much have you told her?! what if she's a spy from one of the enemies we made? she could be the key to our deaths!" locrusilas roared. needless to say he was quite pissed at ink. 'i knew he was dumb sometimes, but honestly...he thinks he can make friends with the enemy!' he thought.

ink waited for locrusilas to calm down and motioned for him to sit. once peace was restored, ink lit his tobbaco stick and began talking.

"i thought she was an enemy spy at first too. after i paralyzed her with my minotaur's-"

"that was what i heard earlier..." locrusilas mumbled to himself. he motioned for ink to continue after he sent him a glare for interrupting.

"-attack...i 'interrogated' her. she definatly had the potential to be a spy of some sort. but i quickly learned that cally here" he motioned to her sleeping form. "was a victim of the attack sigmund led against lumbridge." he took a drag of his stick.

"you mean the one that he tried to brush off as a goblin attack?" loc asked, snow white eyebrows raised.

"the very same. anyway, it turns out siggy turned her into a revenge fueled machine. from there, her hate transferred from the goblins to us for appearantly killing ol' siggy." another drag and ink continued. "all she wants is a little revenge for all the bull shit she had to go through. i feel where she's coming from...but that's from my empathy. you, on the other hand should know how that feels regardless of mental ability. having to sit by and do nothing but sit and bear witness..." he finished.

loc had been staring at the ground throught all of ink's words. he didn't exactly want revenge, just answers for what happened back then...no matter who held the answers he'd cut them down for information. hell, thats why he started guild work in the first place.

"wake her up...i...wanna talk to her...face-to-face..." loc said. sometimes he had to curse ink's ability to feel emotions. sometimes it brought missions to a standstill untill ink came to terms with whatever it was stopping him before.

Ink thought for a moment about telling loc to fuck off and let the girl sleep, but the stern look on his leader's face told him otherwise. he motioned for the dark man to follow him as he walked over, knelt down next to cally, and begin shaking her. she stirred slowly and slowly cracked her eyes open. she really wasn't ready to see or remember a black man with ghost like hair and a tan man with a hood up staring at her.

"AHHH!!!!!" was the first word, or sound rather, to make it out and she promptly ducked under her sleeping bag before remembering the tan man. the brown one however...she couldn't remember...

"oh right...ink and locrusilas...LOC?! only ink was here last night..." she remembered the fight earlier and quickly put on a mask that had 'calm woman' written all over it.

"ohhhhhhhhh...right...sorry about that ink...scared the bloody mary outta me tho" she said as she rubbed the rest of the sleep her eyes.

ink ahemed. " cally, this is my leader locrusilas t-" "loc, please" the darkamn "err...right...loc. of course, you already know him." ink took the last drag off of his stick and smashed it on the ground. "he's my section's clan leader, and your's too provided your serious about this and the headquaters alots you guild membership." ink finally finished and cally gave a nod to confirm she understood.

it was locrusilas' turn to speak now. "ink filled me in on your past problems...i won't ask you to fill in the blank spaces, but i would like to know whether or not i can trust you...whether or not i can put mine and ink's lives in your hands should the need arise. i need to know if i can accually use you when we plan a raid...i refuse to fail a mission because i let someone i couldn't trust onto my team." he spoke in a calm business-like manner, but put a certain edge on his words to get his point across.

cally met loc's gaze and he gave her a look of mild aproval. "but don't worry about that...trust takes a while to build...just like the paperwork tha comes with putting someone in a guild." he began to grumble at that last bit.

the blonde girl on the other hand was shocked. after all those arrows she shot at them, they were willing to allow her to team up with them on guild missions and search for sigmund. "so you're letting me join you?" her voice threatened to crack from excitement. "like ink said, provided your serious...then yes." was the response she got back.

she squealed, something ink and loc never would have figured someone like her to do. she began to stretch but her stomach growled and they all shared a small laugh. after that passed over ink spoke up. he threw a pan from his bag over the fire and began cooking a small meal of chicken and meat stir-fry.

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after finally finishing the rest of the food ink set his dish down.

"well, since we've all put our beef, chicken, and any other foods away, i move we get the hell outta here so we can start with this stupid registration shit." he finish dully and his companions nodded.

"i agree" locrusilas said "the faster we put in the notice, the faster we can get all of this started, and we still gotta get paid for this mission too..." he trailed off and ink twitched as he remembered something. "loc...were we really hired by falador to get rid of those highway men? or were we hired by the monestary east of the barbarian's village like i initally thought?" ink asked.

locrusilas was hesitant on his response. "we were...well you see...yes, we were hired by falador..." loc bent his head down in shame at the fact that he had to lie to get the druid to accept the mission.

"that's what i thought..." was all loc got back from ink. "...anyway...do you have a place of your own, cally?" this time his words were directed at the blonde archer.

"well no...ever since my fa-...sigmund's disappearance, i've been staying where i could." her eyes became dull as her earlier enthusiasm died down.

"...you'll be staying in the guest bedroom at the base then." loc was the one to talk this time " ever since our previous...partner left, its been used as a guest bedroom-"

"YOU MEAN I'LL BE LIVING WITH YOU TWO?!" cally pracically screamed. she was ready for this whole 'guild' thing untill now. yeah, she was comfortable sitting around the duo...but living with them she wasn't so sure about. she couldn't find it in her to turn down their hospitality though. the thought of accually being in a place where she would be accepted sounded nice. back when she lived with sigmund, it was always cold. they hardly spoke unless she would ask about the "goblin" attack. her training quaters were no better, seeing as most NOBLES' children enlisted for lumbridge knightship, and she was anything BUT noble.

"well...the sun's almost up...i think we should start heading back to the base. if we don't send in our report to HQ quickly, we'll lose our holding fee." loc said as he stood up.

after everyone was packed and ready, the small group made their way back to civilation when ink and locrusilas both remembered...

"AH HELL, WE FORGOT THE BODIES!!!!!!!" they both yelled remembering the highway men they'd left.


	3. After 'X' Beers

Chapter 3: After 'X' beers

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Locrusilas sighed. He flopped down onto the couch in the "rec room", as Ink had dubbed it, and closed his eyes. He wasn't searcing for sleep...oh no, he had waaaay to much paperwork to begin on for sleep. Instead, he was going over his mental checklist that seemed to keep growing at every turn.

'Today was a big day.' He stated mentally to himself. It started out easy enough. Find a highway man named jeof, kill him, give report to hq, get money. However, along the way, that Cally decided to make her presence known AGAIN and that led to a small fight, which led to her being in the process of joining the team. Weird how things worked out sometimes.

Loc got up and walked to the 'cooler'...again, one of ink's weird names for the contraption. The dark man faintly remembering something about the dwarves in keldagrim adding a magical approch to their inventions. Whatever it was, the white haired man knew he couldn't live without it. He now had a way to keep his favorite gnome cookies good for days on in so long as he rewarmed the food with a fire rune. He quickly opened the rune stash that laid in every room of the house, pulled out a fire rune, and held its activated form near the delicious treats for a small moment. He felt the food with the back of his hand, and almost snatched one off the plate when he knew they were cool enough to eat. The dark warrior chomped down on the small cookie-cracker treat and allowed himself to fall away to his happy land, where only his gnome crumblies and air to breath existed. he was about to swallow the cookie when...

**WHAM!!!! **

Ink hated doors. Unless they led to the bathroom, he felt no need for them. All they did was get in the way, slow you down, and hurt like a bitch if someone slammed them in your face.

"-And this is the rec room. Don't be surprised if you find me crashin' on the couch over there" ink drawled and pointed to a couch, sitting in front of a large orb sitting on a simple low stand.

"Um...What is that?" Cally asked, unsure of what the large orb thing was.

"...'s an orbviewer...never seen one?" He took a deep breath when he saw her shake her head. He was surprised for the most part. Orbviewers were common things now-a-days, and for someone to have never seen one...well, that was just plain rare.

"It's like this." he began. "Places like the watchtower in Yanille or the marketplace in Varrock use a teleport-type spell to send 'visions', if you will, to these orbs. They range in sizes small enough to fit in your hand, or big enough to crush your house." She shuttered at the thought of trying to move something like that into your home. "You can check out all types of shit on here, like weather, certain sports, stocks...really depends on what channel you tune into." On that last note, Ink walked over to the orb viewer and placed his hand on it. It instantly lit up with a purplish glow and then flickered to a moving image of a wizard in blue robes standing in front of a map of glienor. There were clouds raining in some spots and small suns shining in others. "This is the daily weather report" Ink said, having walked away from the orb satisfied with the channel it was on.

Cally, on the other hand, was confused. "Why cant i hear him?" She asked. She could see the man explaining the weather, but all she heard were various animals and the sound of something similar to air being released from a balloon, only much quieter. Upon looking over, she saw Ink was nodding his head in agreement with the man on the orb.

"Oh yeah." ink said, rubbing the back of his head. "You don't really hear the words, so much as they enter your subconsious and...well I can't really explain it well, but to hear it you kinda gotta focus in, like you were trying to hear someone whispering really quietly." she focused on the orb and frowned several seconds later. "I still can't hear anything." the archer stated dully.

"Well try harder, then." Was the response she'd gotten from the tan man. He'd motioned for her to sit down on the couch and asked her if she was thirsty or hungry. She stated she could use a nice cold beer and Ink laughed, saying she didn't look like the drinking type and that she should opt for something lighter.

"I can handle my drinks! Unlike you..." she smiled at his shocked face "That's right. I saw you pass out when you and Loc went to that bar in Burthope. You were shit faced after three shots!" She laughed when he'd grumbled off over to a large box and pulled out a small keg of beer, poured it in two mugs, and put the keg back in the box. He was about to begin walking back from the 'munchie zone' as he'd called it before, when his foot hit something. Looking down, he was greeted by the sight of a blue faced Locrusilas...from the looks of it having choked on yet another gnome treat. Ink kicked the poor man in the stomach and was unplesantly surprised when a large piece of soggy cookie smacked him in the cheek. He quickly wiped it off and help the once choking man up.

"Lemme guess" Ink cleared his throat and puffed out his chest "'My close brush with death has left me parched. Thou be a good servant boy and fetch me a frothy beverage'" Ink declared as he deepened his voice in an attempt to imitate Locrusilas'.

"'Yes my good lad, now...quickly, before I decide your head might look better missing thine's body.'" locrusilas grinned as ink flipped him off and went to retrieve the rest of the keg. Loc was a big much so, that he'd probably have all the alcohol in the keg gone before he or cally finished their second mug. he reached into the cold box and pulled out a different container of beer than what he poured his or the blondes drinks with. He uncorked it and handed it to the snow haired man.

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After all munchie and drink related business matters were taken care of, Ink, Cally, and Loc sat on the large black couch in front of the orb finder, not really watching it. They were too busy just having a general conversation. Cally proved to fit in quite nicely with the two men. She shocked both the men when she'd asked Ink for a tobacco stick, as smokers of the tobacco stick kind were still spread far and few. The male smoker grinned and threw her a stick and a fire rune, which she promptly lit up with. She figured out what made locrusilas tick when he'd challenged her to a beer guzzling game. Loc won of course, but not by much. Ink watched off to the side, making odd faces or sounds in failed attempts at getting either of the two to mess up.

She had her own share of surprises too. She had laughed to the point of tears when "-badass" stepped up to the stove in the corner and began whiping up another batch of gnome crumblies to replace all the ones his leader had eaten in the short span of time. She'd laughed even harder at the faces the two men made when she'd tested their limits. Ink, being the asshole everyone thought he was, had 'casually' asked if Cally would "taste his treats later" and chuckled, waiting for the stream of insults most women threw after his comments. His jaw, along with Loc's, was hanging however when she simply strolled over, grabbed the spoon still in Ink's hands, and licked it in a very slow, teasing manner. Ten minutes later, she'd still been laughing at the poor druid while he held a towel to his bleeding nose.

The blonde girl had also learned that Loc could be quite abusive to Ink at some points, but seemed to have a soft spot for the cookie things he made. She was pissed when he stole the last cookie, lying that it would be awhile before ink made the cookies again and he needed to get what he could, while he could. Ink had simply thrown his shoe at him for the comment, but he dodged it and the shoe kept going untill it hit the orb, which flicked on at the shoe disturbing it. the image that popped up had shocked cally for a moment, seeing as it was an old man, but quickly calmed down when the wrinkled person had spoken to the men.

"Ah, Ink and Locrusilas. I was just about to contact you two. In regards to your mission, congratulations. Your pay is currently being wired into your account, and should arrive tomorrow." The old man who had just been smiling now donned a serious face, almost dissappointed if you looked at it right. "But...we will be keeping half because you failed to eliminate the body...or bodies, I should say, which is mainly why we are taking so much." He looked at the dark man "Locrusilas...i'd like to speak with you soon...face to face..." Loc visibly shuttered, but raised his hand before the old man could chide him anymore.

"That would be most excellent sir, as I have been meaning to speak with you about adding another to our section, sir!" He quickly bit off in a soldier type manner, all evidence that he was under the influence was gone.

"Very good, I knew you'd have no trouble finding a replacement for your section." the wrinkled man was smiling again, though it was hard to tell the way his face sagged everywhere. "I'll expect you at my office in a week's time. 'Till then, you know what to do...dismissed." He said in an offical manner. He was rewarded with another "Sir" before the orb shut off.

"Well, you heard the man...one week before we gotta make that dumb ass trip" Ink relented. It just so HAPPENED to be that the HQ was at the deserts farthest reaches. They said it was to avoid opposing guilds, but he really thought it was just to piss off their employees, considering the main members never left the building.

"Where do we have to go?" Cally asked.

"Past Pollienivich, near an oasis." Loc said and proceeded to fill her in on how they'd be getting there. Uortunatly enough the guild paid for carpet rides, but that didn't lower the temperature of the sun any. After he was done explaining the proper manners, pay, pros, cons, and even promotions, he told the new member that they had a meeting every morning at ten o'clock to discuss the business of the day. When she nodded to show she understood the dark skinned leader streched and mumbled something about hard work and beer make for an excellent sleeping aid before heading off to his room.

Now left alone was an intoxicated summoner with an equily intoxicated archer. They'd sat for a moment, both trying not to come off as drunken idiots. One question later, they were instantly pulled into the latest drunken debate: ranging or summoning. One person would say no skill was needed for the others craft, and the other would counter saying that the others skill was for people who couldn't fight hand to hand. The arguement was completly oxymoronic, but after the insults stopped it became a small chat on the finer points of their chosen skill as the night drifted on.

"So what do you think 'bout cross-bows?" the blonde slurred. The alcohol was begining to take it's effect but she brushed off the spinning vision and took another gulp of her beer.

"Meh...I shot and even carried a few before-" he guzzled the beer he had for a second before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and continuing. "-but I always saw the ammunition as too expensive. Arrows too...everything about shooting is fucking expensive" He finished with a sheepish smile.

"Yeah, I find that making my own arrows is cheaper than buying them."

"Do you make the arrow heads too?"

"So, thats too much work. see, I buy the arrowheads at a special shop, then I buy the logs that I whittle into arrow shafts." She made carving like motions on an imaginary log with her hands.

"Then I take the arrow heads and shove the connector point down in the shafts." At this, she made motions as if she were trying to force something into a thin object. The druid took another gulp or two of beer and laughed at the way she stuck her tounge out and up as if she were deep in concentration.

"Then I attatch the feathers for balance" She said and began laying invisable feathers on her invisable arrow. "And then you're done!" she said. Her companion 'hmph'ed at her and she shot him a look.

"Well what about you? What do you do thats so special?" She said pointing her finger at him as if she were mad, but the smile on her face betrayed her actions. The tan man looked at her with both eyebrows raised.

"Hello? The animals? Remember them? Yeah, that's me." He waved his hand as if trying to get someone's attention in a crowd. She slapped his hand down and held it in place on the couch.

"Break it down for me then, animal man. How do you do what you do?" She was surprised she could say that tounge twister while being as intoxicated as she was. the blonde chalked it up to the heat of the discussion and her teammate spoke.

"Well, first you gotta be able to control the things you summon with your spiritual energy." Cally raised an eyebrow at him and he waved her off. "Don't bother asking about it. I mean, you can study to learn how to control something everyone has, but to leash things from another realm...well, that's a whole different line of training." She nodded and he continued. "Second, it helps if you have a natural connection with animals. You can't just call a dog and have it come to you." Again another nod. "Third, don't try to tell the animal what to do. That's a sure way to lose the small control you have over it. Once you gain a 'friendship' with one type of familar, they'll allow you to use your spirit energy to control their movements, but untill then it's not recommended"

"Kinda like how you did when we fought?" She asked and he snapped his fingers.

"YES! Just like that." he gave her a thumbs up.

"Ok, you told me about the 'basics', now I wanna hear the real thing. How do you do it?" she inquired and Ink had to put his beer down.

"It's like this. At these HUGE rocks that act as a portal between our realm and the spirit realm, you use four things. These would be spirit pouches; They hold the familar until its opened and the essence of the familar is let out, then it takes shape and boom. insta-familar." He said, throwing up invisible confetti up and the archer laughed, locking eyes with the man who was informing her of his art.

"A couple of spirit shards;" he continued after taking a breath."-these are sorta like...spirit bait. Enough of them will attract a certain type of familar to your pouch. They work with these charms that act like the trap of the bait. Once the spirit is drawn into the pouch, the charm makes sure they don't leave. Unfortunatly some charms aren't powerful enough to keep the spirit in the pouch, and other charms are so powerful that the spirit might not even be able to get into the pouch in the first place." He picked up his glass and drained it of the last little bit of beer inside it and set it back down.

"Wouldn't being trapped in a pouch piss off a spirit, especially an animal's spirit?" She asked a little bit confused.

"Normally yes, but with the spirit shards for food and an object that relates to their spefic nature they're comfortable being inside a pouch."

"So like...the minotaur you summoned-" the blonde trailed off and ink continued where she left off.

"-Lives around alot of metal in his realm, so a metal of the same type with food, the spirit shards, is a good enough environment for him." He finished and waited for a moment before looking at the girl who was talking to him. She looked a little green. All of a sudden she jolted up and out of the room, and in a few minutes she was back in the door frame, informing Ink she was going to bed due to spinning rooms. He raised his empty mug to her in a gesture of a good night and she was gone.

The druid remembered getting up in the same manner as the one who just left not shortly after he laid down, and emptied his stomach's contents in the bathroom before plopping back down on the couch and zonking out.

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	4. Success!

Ok! Trust me when i say that even though the story is slowing down in action, and it will slow even further for the next couple of chapters, it will return full force. Seriously! The action continues for about four chapters, if you subtract the small section of down time i wrote to accompany it. Anyway, heres...

chapter 4:sucess!

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The next morning, Ink awoke to the smell of coffee. He slowly cracked one eye open and was blinded by the doctor light from hell...or thats what it felt like anyway.

After a minute or so of eye preparation, he sat up. Boy, that was a mistake...his head felt like it got bitch slapped by a gorilla, making it difficult to figure out that he was in the rec room along with a hung over white haired man and an equally hung over blonde. Loc was looking very official in his black and white suit...well, he would have looked official if he wasn't cradling his head in his hands. The blonde was sitting at the counter bent over in the same position as their dark skinned leader, by her was the coffee pot.

'Is the risk worth the gain?' Ink questioned in his head. Judging by the way she was holding her head, he assumed she was like Locrusilas in the morning. Combined with the female's attitude that only lead to one thing.

"Bitchy..." Ink muttered. he got up off of the couch to plop down at the table. Loc had a few papers spread out in front of him. None of which were getting done, but Ink payed it no mind. He was used to hungover Loc. Just don't be a smart ass and you won't get hurt. He wondered if cally was the same as he reached his hand under his skull cap to scratch an intch.

"Oh cally dear, Could you pour me a tall cup of that delicious coffee over there?" He asked in a sing song voice. The bloodshot woman looked up at him for a few minutes before shaking her head and deciding to flip him off.

"Wonderful...thanks babe" the tired druid said, sarcasm replacing the humor in his tone "Well then, seeing as we all feel like shit, I'm gonna go whip up some home brew so we can get on with the day." He stood up and was about to head for the door when he noticed both of his team mates staring at him. well, Cally was averting her eyes...Loc just looked like he was about to bust a nut laughing.

"What?" Ink asked. Last he checked he was still intact...alive...normal for the most part.

"What?!" He asked again in a louder tone as he looked to either of his comrades. The dark man stifled a laugh and the tan man snapped.

****

"WHAT?!"

Ink finally yelled. Neither of them answered him and combined with the hangover, things were turning pretty shitty. Loc finally bust out laughing and pointed towards the smaller one. Cally turned around as Ink looked down and turned pale pretty fast for a tan man.

It turns out that last night Ink changed into his more comfortable silk sleeping pants.

Well...silk's not the best at stopping, or hiding, morning wood.

Ink made a mad dash out of the rec room and into his room. Once he had downed a bottle of home brew to stop the hang over, he changed into his traditional white hoodie and black shorts combo with the grey skull cap. After smoking a tobacco stick and calming down from the earlier experience, he relieved himself in his connected bathroom and walked back to the rec room with a few bottles of his ever appreciated home brew. Upon opening the door he was greeted with the sight of an even worse Locrusilas. The laughing had worsened his hangover and he was now groaning at the table with his head down. He looked up at the sound of an opening door and a grin adorned his face.

"Thank god you're back Ink. Gimme the home brew before i kill ya." The white haired leader said as he walked up to ink and snatched a bottle. When he downed it in a few gulps, he shivered and passed another bottle to cally and leaving the room.

"So...this home brew...what is it?" Cally asked as she sniffed the strange liquid in the bottle. In her hungover state, she was willing to drink almost anything to cure it...alsmot anthing.

"It's just tea that's been left to sit in coconuts...'ancient recipe' I guess you could say. Dunno why but it cures headaches and naseua in a snap." Ink informed her. she immeadiatly gulped it down and shivered the same as loc. When she freaked out again due to the shivering she was more than satisfied after she learned that was just the feeling of left over alcohol leaving the system. The blonde lost it again when she learned she'd have about 2 minutes to get to the bathroom before she wet herself.

"That's the price of ridding a hangover." She was told on her way out, barging past a returning Locrusilas and darting straight to the bathroom.

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After the hang overs we gone and everone was settled and ready for business, it was about nine-thirty in the morning. The meeting between the three was currently underway, but that really just consisted of everyone having a late breakfast in the diner area while Locrusilas informed them on what would be happening that day.

"So wait, missions? I thought the guild just paid you to do guard work and whatnot." Cally questioned.

"Nope." Locrusilas began."Every six months the guild hands out the missions to be completed. Some are handed at the begining and have a while to finish, like finding certain items that need to be collected by the H.Q, while others can be handed down in an hour and must be done A.S.A.P" he finished and the blonde looked at tad bit confused

"...Emergencies" Ink said after Loc glanced in his direction. She nodded for the dark skinned man to continue.

"Right, um...oh! At the end of every month we go to pick up a new work schedule. That consists of your pay, your identification tags, and your current company stocks. Any other business can be conducted during your appointment. Every three months you are sent for your evaluation. That's whats gonna determine whether or not you can continue guild work. Don't worry though, they let you return the next month if you fail the first time." he took a sip of his coffee and continued. "thats what today's training is gonna be about today, seeing as it's friday. we'll forego the A.M training and skip straight to personal training. There I'll teach you what the guild wants to see, and because you're a new recruit, they're gonna wanna see what you can do same day." He finally stamped a paper, put it in a pile with other papers, and picked up another. "Any other business before we end the meeting?" He asked

"Uh...I'll be needing the next couple days off." Ink said as he looked away from whatever he was writing and loc's eyes snapped up to the younger man.

"Normally, i'd be willing to let you go work on whatever for however long, but we need the guild to add cally to our roster before our section is terminated...and to do that we have to make sure that cally's up to guild standards." The warrior finished.

"...Right, sorry." Ink said and went back to whatever notes he was making. Loc made a confused face. Normally Ink put up a bigger fight about vacation days.

"Cally, I'll need to speak to you alone after this in my office" Loc said as a he brought his attention from Ink to her. the audible sound of a pencil breaking and a muttered 'Fuck' caused the druid to get up and leave to room to head to the supply closet for another pencil.

"...Or now's a good time..." said the dark man. "Look. Ink's acting funny. Normally i'd watch him, but he'd sense my thoughts and know I was watching soo..." he finished the sentence slowly and Cally nodded.

"I'll watch him." Was the response he got and he smiled.

"Just make sure he doesn't do anything that looks too dangerous. Other than that, you can go find Ink and tell him we're all finished up here." He ended and went back to the small stack of papers he now had.

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Ink was walking to the small supply closet deep in thought, staring a note pad he had in his hands. When he got his pencil he quickly erased a small part and wrote something else in its place. He began his walk back but was stoped when he saw the blonde in front of him. What was she munching on? was that a...?

"Where'd you get that?" Ink asked as he shut his notepad and put it in his pocket.

"Your stash. You need to pick a better spot to hide your cookies." she smirked and took another bite.

"How many have you had?!" ink yelled.

"...How many was in there?" she said and finished the cookie.

"Don't...Shit...That was the last?" he asked and she nodded. "Then I'll have to make more later. Hey, did loc say we were done yet?"

"Yeah, he told me to tell you training's at twelve. I don't know about you, but I think im gonna go a little earlier. warm-up a little bit, y'know?" She asked and he nodded

"Mmhmm, I was going after I got my pencil anyway. If it was important, Loc would have came and got me, but since we're done..." He trailed off. "Anyway, the training area is outside. Follow the path so you go to the right spot. It's a good distance away, but thats a good thing sometimes." He pointed out the window to a small area surrounded by trees.

"Alright..." the blonde paused. "Well, I'm gonna get ready. See ya when i see ya." She turned and began to walk to her room to get ready to train with her team mates.

The archer smiled. she had people who she could trust now, and a home...well a room. Better than what she had she supposed. She rounded the corner and went into her room. The archer wasted no time in sliping her red dragonskin vest over her equally red tank top, fitting her quiver over her shoulder, grabbing her bow, and heading out the door. She followed the hallway out the back door and continued to follow the trail. She stopped when she heard something all too familar and she turned around just in time to see it.

****

"Summoning: Spirit Terrorbird!"

Ink bellowed as soon as he steped out the door. Next to him a large saddled ostrich type bird with a sharp rounded beak and powerful looking legs appeared in a small flash of blue flames. He mounted it and rode up to cally.

"Need a lift?" He asked with his hand outstretched. She nodded and he pulled her up to ride on the bird. As soon as she was sure she wouldn't fall off he tugged the reins twice and they were off.

"HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEY!!!!" Cally screamed unprepared for the sudden burst of speed.

"Quit whining, you get used to it" Ink replied as he guided the giant bird to the training spot.

"I'm just saying...warn somebody before you do that" She said after she regained her composure. Of course that lasted for about all of a second as Ink soon started making the bird jump over the pre-fallen tree trunks. She looked and saw they were very close to the training area. So close in fact she could see all the obstacles and dummys inside. It was a nice set up, and she guessed the fallen trees were a good example of why it was away from the main base. She briefly wondered what either of them did that dropped such large trees...

"You can let go now..." Ink said. Cally still had her arms wrapped around him and to be honest....well, never mind that. He just wanted to train now. When she finally realized they wern't moving anymore she blushed and let go of the druid.

"I'm sorry...I kinda dazed out there" she said looking away.

"Yeah, I have that effect on women" The tan man grinned and Cally rolled her eyes, but smilled nonetheless.

"Ass." She said and jumped off. "I try." was the response she got.

"So...you good here? Or did you want me around?" the summoner asked

"Well to be honest..." She began but remembered she was supposed to watch Ink for 'funny stuff' and she was sure he wouldn't do 'funny stuff' around her. "...I'm good by myself". Ink nodded and waved as he and his bird took off.

She figured she'd give him about five...ten minutes tops before she started watching him. So in that small interval, she stretched and shot a couple arrows at the dummies.

"Nine outta ten...good, and now..." she closed her eyes

****

"Hawk Eyes: Activate!"

She yelled and opened her eyes which were now a deep yellow with the eagle slits in them. Reaching behind her, Cally grabbed an arrow and knocked it.****

"Part Deux: Snapshot!"

She yelled and let go. Before the first arrow even hit its target she already had another knocked back and fired. It went on from there, and in five seconds ten targets were hit in critical points. Her eyes faded back to blue and she looked around. She smiled upon realizing she still had near perfect accuracy, which was completely perfect with her hawk eyes. The blonde repeated the practice over and over, occasionally adding new things like multiple arrows or bounding off trees and shooting. She had just jumped on a dummys shoulders to shoot its head. She knocked back the arrow and fired ,after which flipping in front of it to fire another into its chest.

That was when she felt an explosion of something that put her on the ground. when she got back up and looked around for ink, she saw something shimering deeper in the woods and figured that was best place as any to start looking

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Ink had done it, and faster that he'd calculated too. For months now, He'd been trying to find a way to temporarily fuse himself and his summons. He'd gone over the theory, which was to summon them in the EXACT same position you were, and he'd figured it was going to take forever just to get the aim correct...but after he missed with the first few summons he dropped that idea. Next, he tried summoning in the air and jumping into the familar while it formed, but all that resulted in was him colliding with the summon and falling, or missing it completely and falling on his face. Finally, he slammed the pouch onto himself out of frustration and lack of planning, but that was the ticket. Sure as hell the spirit wolf pouch he'd used merged with him in a flash of bright light. A cloak of white and blue covered his shoulders, and his forearms had been covered in blue and white fur, along with his hands which now had claws.

"Success!" He half yelled to himself. He was as excited as a kid on christmas.

'The possibilities of this could be endless.' He thought. 'This alone might be enough to...' He sighed. He didn't want to ruin his happy mood by thinking of that right now. Shaking his head of memories, He pulled out a scroll blue scroll. Like he normally would have when using a summoning scroll, he concentrated his energy into it, but when nothing happened he was confused. Ink tucked the scroll away for another time and began attempting to get used to this...he didn't even know what to call it.

But he was damn sure he loved it. He could jump from tree to tree, his claws could easily cut large branches, and he was quick. But he still didn't understand why the scroll didn't work. He pulled it back out and looked at it. All that was on it was the foriegn writing of the spirit plane. Nothing he could read at all. Frustrated, he yelled and threw the paper.

He shouldn't have thrown the scroll...because as soon as he opened his hand to let it go, the same howl attack that a spirit wolf releases blasted from his hand. that was something he wasn't prepared for ...and so he flew. His path was blocked by the ever so present trees and he hit them. Hard.

The last thing he saw before he blacked out was a red figure running towards him.  
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ok, i just wanna say that i know in runescape there is no such thing as what ink did in the last scene, but what fun would it be to read something you already knew about? thats right, fuck the rules! I'm gonan bring some shit nobody EVER thought of...ok well maybe the idea crossed one or two peoples' heads, but not like this!


	5. Real Revenge

chapter 5

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Twelve o'clock had rolled around, and Locrusilas figured it was time to go to the training spot for Cally's pre-evaluation. He had already grabbed his red two-handed sword and rune pouch from his room. The only thing he had to do now was to let the house maid know to lock up and take off. Part one was completed and as he made for the back door of the large house/base a rather fast red projectile came crashing through. The white haired leader's training immeadiatly snapped into action as he tripped the intruder into the crook of his arm and put said person into a tight chokehold, with just enough room to breath. As soon as his natural senses took over, he realized it was Cally and dropped the choke hold while helping her stand. The dark man quickly stammered out an apology and asked her why she'd come bursting through the door.

"There's something wrong with Ink!" she practically screamed at the tall man. "H-H-He did this thing and he glowed and then a blast and when I went to see what happened he was laying against a tree looking like he'd just got beaten by an ogre! I checked him to see if he was ok but he didn't wake up. After that I ran here and..." She trailed off. The tall man knocked her head with his knuckle to get her to look at him.

"Relax, knowing Ink he probably just hit his head too hard. Still, we better go get him." Locrusilas said when he finally got her attention. "Here...grab on and I'll get us there quicker." He said while digging through his rune pouch. She complied and gripped on to his sleeve. Loc finally pulled out the pebble sized runes and instantly they were teleported to the entrance of the training spot.

"You remember where he is?" The warrior asked.

"Yeah...Lets see..." Cally said and wandered in with her leader following.

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"How is it you forgot where he is already?" Locrusilas asked irratedly.

"It's your forest, you should know your way around." The red archer bit back.

"It's not like I saw where the guy blasted himself off to." he retorted. He went to say more but shut his mouth when cally sent him a death glare.

"..." Silence.

"Hello?" The dark man asked. She put her hand up for him to be quiet for a minute.

"..."

"..."

"

you two gonna stand there and bicker all day for are you gonna fuggin' help me!?" The red girl heard in the distance

"Over there!" She pointed and dashed off, her new leader hot on her trail.

(...)

The pair evantually came upon a battered and bruised Ink. His hands were burned from tip to elbow, his back had a horrible bruise from where he hit the tree, and the tips of his fingers were bleeding.

"Good god man you look like hell." came from a shocked locrusilas. "How the hell you beat yourself this bad I just don't know."

"I'll fill you in later...it's just...I can't move...pissin' me off." Ink half-grunted through the pain. "Got runes to teleport?" He asked and Loc nodded. "Good. I hurt, and would like sleep." He said. Cally watched the as Loc pulled out the proper runes and instantly they were off.

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Back in the house/base, a medic was over looking Ink. Loc sat in his "office" as he called it doing paperwork, while the blonde sat on the couch in the rec room watching the orb viewer with a small white fluff. She learned how to change the channel, and was currently watching the annual Gnomeball championship. Again, nothing she knew about, but it kept her mind on something while she waited. Loc was cool and all, but he was too official. He had good points but whenever you looked up he was up to his eyes in papers. Even when she'd been tailing them for the past week, the suited man was always doing papers.

Then there was Ink...was that his real name? She'd have to ask him. He'd been keeping her entertained while she's been here, even if it was only a short while. not that she was attracted to him. no...he was too much of an ass for that. she smirked.

'He's odd though' she thought to herself.

When they'd came back earlier, she went into his room to get his pouches. While she was in his room she'd heard yapping of somekind, but she dismissed the sound in favor for the search for the pouch stache. That what Ink said it was anyway, but there were so many that he kept them in a giant safe in his room. Using the combination he'd given her, she quickly walked in and grabbed a pouch that had a picture of a red orb with white electricity on it.

She quickly ran back to the special room set up for injuries and gave it to the visiting medic...for what god knows...but he said it'd help Ink heal.

As soon as the medic thanked her for her help she doubled back to the druid's room. she thought she heard something earlier, and true to memory the yapping immeadiatly began when she steped in the door. She'd taken two steps in when she felt something tugging at her shoe. Cally looked down and her eyes grew into giant blue pools of 'awww'

It was a small, white pit bull puppy.

She dropped down and swooped the puppy up in her arms. He licked her on the cheek and that was it. She was in love with the dog. She was going to steal the dog.

(...)

So now here she was, laying on the couch, watching the o.v, dog asleep on her chest. It snored every now and then and she had to stifle a giggle everytime it did so to avoid waking the runt.

"Awww...Aren't you just the epitome of family friendly?" Someone drawled. They sounded tired and cally instantly knew who it was.

"Go to hell Ink" she responded without looking at him. He came in and stood behind the couch. She turned her head to look at him and she felt her cheeks tinge red. For there was Ink in all his tan shirtless glory. She'd seen him shirtless, but she had a hangover then and when she actually looked at ink, she turned away due to a wardrobe malfunction. But now she was sober, and being someone who rarely even spoke to men...

Her thoughts were cut off when Ink reached down and scratched the small puppy on the head. It's blue eyes flashed open and it looked up. As soon as it recognized the man it jumped from Cally's chest and into Ink's arms where it recieved immeadiate ear scratchings.

The blonde laughed at the small puppy who sat in Ink's arms. The little thing almost looked like it was smiling. Ink WAS smiling at the little puppy who'd grunt everytime his owner scratched a certain spot.

"Whats his name?" the blonde asked. The dog had some how made it onto Ink's head and was chewing on his skull cap.

"Kane" The druid replied, holding his hands up to catch the dog if he fell.

"So you really love animals, huh?"

"Yeah, they saved my ass on numerous occasions when I was little. So my way of paying them back was studying summoning to learn to fight on my own. From there I raised many animals that I released back into the wild. Unfortunatly cash was getting low around my village, so I left in search of money to fund us again." He finished as he caught the puppy and gave it to cally whom he began licking.

"Never figured someone like you was the animal type." She smiled. "So what village did you come from?"

"Umm...Taverly." he spat the name out quickly.

"Hm. Its pretty around taverly during fall, don't you thi-" she was cut off.

"I think kane's getting hungry so i'm gonna go feed him real quick." he picked the dog up and walked over to the ice box. he pulled out a steak and tossed it to the puppy.

"...You didn't really come from taverly, did you?" She asked from the other side of the room. She didn't get an answer. The archer asked again, but eventually dropped it opting for some lighter talk.

"So you like crossbows?" Cally asked half heartly, not enjoying the awkward silence.

"They're ok..." He responded monotonely.

"...Can I ask a question Ink?" The blonde asked in a small voice.

"Shoot."

"What's that tattoo on your back about...the biohazard symbol I mean" as soon as she finished the sentece she saw the animal man tense up.

"...You recall the 6/6/06 event right?" He asked as he stood. The dog had stopped eating and was staring at it master with it's head cocked.

"Yeah. The falador massacre...I heard the Falador guard lost alot of men that day." she answered grimly.

"All that..." he paused "...It's bullshit. Falador was too scared to send in their own forces. So what did they do?" He asked the question to no-one "They skipped over to Taverly and FORCED-" he punched the wall. "-the people there to FIGHT-" he punched the wall again. "-for them!" he slumped on the counter.

"Ink..."her voice cracked and tears were already begining to fall for the man. That was a decade ago, and he couldn't have been that old so he must have been young while all those killings were happening.

"But thats not even the end of it." the angered druid continued. "Taverly knew Falador would at one point try to take them over. Thats just how Falador was...territorial bastards...So what do THEY do? They skip to the villiage that used to be just south of them, raided THAT village, and took everyone there as 'stand ins' for the druids of Taverly...so many of them were lost that day...women, children...It didn't matter. If you could swing a sword, you fought. Taverly got away scot free and after all those villagers wasted their LIVES wearing down the threats, the Falador guard finally steped up and eliminated the problem! In the end, THEY were the heroes. Anyone from the village who was left alive was marked..." He turned and showed Cally his back. "-and forced into slavery...they'll pay one day, I swear to the gods...both of them will..." He finally finished. He looked pissed enough to destroy an entire army with a glance while Cally simply cried for the pain the man had gone through. No thought about it, she jumped over the couch and gripped the angry man in a comforting hug. She cried into his chest for minutes on end, sobbing that she was sorry every now and then. Ink looked up when he heard the doors burst open and and an angry looking Loc striding in.

"You've got five minutes to get the fuck out and relax somewhere, Ink." Loc said in his angry business voice. He knew exactly what happened. Someone brought up the Falador massacre and Ink lost his temper. He snapped quick whenever that incident was brought up in anyway. Loc was used to it by now, and only used the anger because it was the only way to get through to the enraged man. Get the empath to feel all the anger and scare him into submission.

"No...Yeah, it's cool man. I was just about to go cool down." The druid grabbed cally by the shoulders and lightly pushed her off him. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a slip of paper which he promptly handed to Loc. "For the damages, bro." And with that he was gone. Needless to say, the dark skinned man was stunned. Normally it took anger to calm him down and get him out for a while, but this time he went willingly. Hell, normally he destoyed more than what he did too. Three holes in the wall was nothing compared to what he'd done on earlier occasions. Then the dark man looked at the crying figure in red who was holding a small wimpering dog.

"What happened?" he asked the blonde archer. "I...ask-asked him about his tattoo and he snapped." She sobed.

"Did he hurt you?" The suited man asked again. He breathed a relieved sigh when she shook her head. "Don't worry, he's just going for a drink in the seer's village. He'll be back in the morning." He smiled only to frown moments later.

"I...I'm gonna go after him." She started to walk foward.

"I don't recommend that...he prefers to be alone after these incidents." the white haired warrior blocked her path.

"I don't care!" Cally yelled as she shoved past him and took off out the door. All Locrusilas could do was sigh. He'd better get the paperwork ready for a repairman.

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In the seer's villiage bar there was only one customer tonight. Right up front sitting in silence was Ink. Nobody knew where the bartender went, but the druid had a whole bottle to himself, almost half of which was gone now. Another figure in red steped in through the double doors. She noticed the one man sitting at the counter in a white hoody, so she went and sat down next to him.

"Hey" she said quietly. he took a swig before talking to her.

"Come to tell me I'm too angry? yeah...I suppose I am..." another swig; Followed by him taking a tobbaco stick out and lighting it.

"No...I came to tell you to come back." She tried to look him in the eye but he looked away.

"Can't...I'm drinkin' still" He slurred and waved the bottle.

"So then you're gonna run?" She asked. That finally caught his attention.

"Hey, I don't run from shit! I was there, okay? I fought that day so I could live! So my village could live! I saw plenty of my people who tried to run, only get shot in the back or cut down on the spot. That day I killed my first person! I was twelve! What child goes through that with a fear of anything afterwards? Not one. Anyone who lived that day just doesn't care."

"You act like you're the only one who saw killings! Those lumbridge slaughters that YOU SAY my FATHER caused. True, only a few people died that day, but I saw death, personally I might add...and then, later on in life..." She laughed dryly "My 'father' had me commiting assassinations by thirteen. Do you know how many people I killed that had done nothing wrong?"

"Then why didn't you stop? You had a choice." The druid took a long swig from the bottle.

"I was thirteen! He'd told me they were plotting against lumbridge. So he told me to take them out..." She fell silent.

"Sounds like we both been through some shit, huh?" The drunk man asked and she nodded."want some?" He waved the bottle back and forth; to which she nodded and was passed the bottle.

"What is it?" she questioned.

"Spiced rum" Ink grinned and she took a swig, after which she asked for a cigarette, to which the man was shocked that she learned the name. He'd always figured tobacco stick was the easiest way to tell people what it was. He smiled and tossed her a stick, and she boasted that she already had a fire rune and lit up. Cally exhaled the smoke and eyed the white figure in the seat next to her. She had questions about the man's past, just to connect the dots and get an image, but would another question set the drunken man off?

'Only one way to find out.' The blonde thought to herself and took a puff off the cigarette. After letting out the smoke her voice was heard.

"So...why are you in the guild? I mean, Locrusilas is trying to find out why what happened back then...but you, you already know what happened AND why it did. so why? Why do you risk your life working for the guild?" The male smoker glanced at her and laughed. He took a breath of the cancerous smoke before answering her question.

"You probably think this is gonna sound cliche..." He said, the laugher and light tone leaving his voice again. "But I need...power. The guild gets me access to places that regular civilians can't get to...and those places might have my power." Ink finished and took another deep drink of the bottle.

"What do you need power for? It's not like you're intending on commiting some haneous crime..." She trailed off as their eyes met, her's widening on seeing the druid's dead set determination. "Oh my god...what...but you work for a place that ENFORCES the law! Why would you turn all of a sudden?!" Cally yelled, practically begging for more answers.

"I told you, Falador and Taverly BOTH will pay...I can't...I don't have enough power to do anything right now. But I will, and when I do, i'm going to overthrow the kingdom of Falador. Once thats done, im taking Taverly; where the few survivors of my village and come and live together." The tan man said and raised his hand to shush her when she was about to speak. "But i'm not done there. Oh no. All the fuckers who sent my people to death...I'll make THEM slaves, let THEM see how the lifestyle works." He took a big drag from his cigarette and smashed it out on the bar's counter..

"But what about the innocents?! All the townsfolk that may be killed?! You'd be causing the same thing that happened to your village back then! Don't you care?"

"But I do...That's why I did my research. I know who the fuck sent the command for slaves in Falador, and I know the bastard that caused the invasion of MY village. The REAL innocents will be spared...but the people who had the slightest fucking thing to do with that day...They'll feel the pain of every life lost that day, and before i'm done with them they'll be begging me to kill them off." The moonlight peaked out from behind a cloud and illuminated the bar, some of the light giving a better view of the man. Cally found that with the moonlight she could see his face better, and noticed the silent tears falling from his eyes. "That's my plan cally...That's why I need power and that's why I joined the guild. I was turned into an animal that day, Cally...watching all the bloodshed...Call it cliche again, but..." He trailed off, taking another swig of the rum. "I won't stop for anything...even if Loc were to stand up and tell me I was wrong...even if YOU were to stand up and tell me I was wrong..." Ink looked directly into Cally's eyes and she swore she saw a purple flash in the druid's normally brown eyes.

"If ANYONE tried to interfere with my plan...I'd kill them" He finished and the blonde's adrenaline soared through the roof. Maybe it was the fear that he'd snap one day and start attacking...Maybe it was the anger she felt from the threat. Whatever it was...it sent a chill down her spine. Wait...was it...

...Hate? Hate for the man who intended to kill or torture anything that stood the way of his victims? But he was normally such a kind person...

The archer was confused as hell. The same man who welcomed her into his home with a smile was now the same man that one day might make an attempt on her life. What happened to being an empath, feeling what others thought. The things he was describing right now was heartless...But he did plan to spare the innocents, provided no one tried to stop him.

"So this is real revenge, hm?" Cally asked and the druid looked at her with raised eyebrows. "Not giving a damn and living only for the grand finale-"

"Help me." Ink interupted. "Help me do this...please...I don't care what happens after that...just...it's all I live for..." He took the last swig of the rum and held it in his hand for a moment, only to throw it against the wall and shatter it.

"There are other things to live for, Ink..." She began but was cut off by her companion again.

"This is all I have Cally" He said, lighting another cigarette. "The only thing im destined for is revenge...and then death sooner or later...but at least my village will be restored...and before you suggest trying to just rebuild and start over i'll remind you that anyone with the falador slave symbol belongs to falador, and our running is a crime, oddly enough, punishable by death. So, just trying to move back is dangerous...hell, even the guild was reluctant to even let me in it's building." The smoker paused for a moment to take a hit of the tobacco but started talking again through the smoke. "I can't die happy until I take over falador...either I do it or die trying."

"I'll think about it, Ink, but I think you should reconsider this whole idea..." The moonlight faded and the bar was back to it's lonely former state. "And I really think you should just come home already..." She said and the druid struck a thinking pose.

"I'll think about it" he said and smiled. Not ten seconds later they were stumbling home.

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	6. The Calm

chapter 6: The Calm

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Cally awoke the next day alone in someone else's bed. She felt a small ball of warm snuggled next to her, which she soon discovered was a sleeping Kane. She slowly moved the dog and glanced around the room. Ink was sitting at his desk in the corner scribbling in the same notepad he'd had the other day.

"Mornin' sunshine!" He greeted with a wave over his shoulder and she threw a pillow at him.

"Pervert! You had me in here all last night. Who knows what sick things you did in your sleep!" She yelled.

"Hey now, is that anyway to talk to the man who made you breakfast?" He pointed to the nightstand that had a heaping stack of chocolate chip pancakes.

"How'd you know-" She began but was cut-off when Ink began snoring loudly and muttering 'pancakes'. He sat back up, tapped his head as if to say 'Empathy baby, yeah', gave her a grin and went back to writing.

"Because of the damage I caused yesterday, Loc called off the meeting for today. Fortunatly for us the man can't move without knowing everyone's schedule, so we pretty much get the day off." He was a little surpised at first when he got no reply, but upon turning around to see Cally stuffing her face full of pancakes he simply chuckled and went back to writing.

Things were going better since she moved in...'Wasn't much to move in though.' She said. After the whole lumbridge incident she just went where Sigmund went. Come to think, after the druid and warrior stoped the crazed old man, she probably hadn't slept in a real bed before she moved in with them. Well, that was then and this is now. Things DO tend to change, after all.

"...Last night..." she began.

"OH YEAH!" he exclaimed "Yeah, you were pretty kinky there" He grinned and winked; then laughed when her face dropped. "Relax, i'm just messing with you. Nothing happened. Like I told you in the draynor forest, I don't '_lust_' after women." He said with a sober face. "You were warm though." He laughed when she pretended to look elsewhere.

"So...now what..." She asked.

"Well...I was accually thinking about taking Kane for a walk through varrock today, then go to the Grand Exchange and check on a few things" She noticed Kane perked up at the mention of a possible walk.

"The grand exchange...?" She was still confused. So many things she didn't know about...How long had it been around? Did Gigmund really keep her away from that many things?

"You really don't know of it?" He sighed when she shook her head. "Fine, then you can come with me today. Since you don't know of that, then you most likely don't have a bank account?" Another shake of the head. "Then we'll set you up with all that good shit today. I'll go ahead and tell Loc that we'll be leaving, so you can go ahead and shower-" He pointed to a small door in the corner of his room; it led to a small bathroom. "-and change. I got you new clothes earlier from your room." She looked towards the hamper in the corner of his room and on top was her trademark crimson tanktop and equally red pants. She briefly wondered if Ink had gotten ALL the articles of clothing she'd be needing, but before she could berate him for such he was already gone.

She looked at the dog who looked right back as if to say 'Don't worry, this is normal behaviour'

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A hot shower and ten minutes later, she walked into Ink's main room with a towel wrapped around her. Truth be told, she really needed a shower. Showers at inns worked but ...just...ew...

She sat back on the bed and almost like sittng on a switch; Ink walked into the room only mutter an 'oops' and walk back out.

"It's ok. You can't see anything." She called. After a small moment, he opened the door, and after glancing in to assure himself he walked in and sat down at his desk. There was an awkard silence as he stared at the wall.

"You can turn around, you know" She said. The blonde had to admit, the man was adamant in willpower...but it was still fun to push his buttons. He hesitantly turned around and instantly met with her eyes. He was too worried that if his eyes went anywhere else she'd lose it...or he'd lose it. True, you couldn't see anything, but the way the towel clung it wasn't any better.

"So when are we going?" She asked after a while. Having a man look you in the eye when your half naked was stranger than she thought it'd be. The silence was worse.

"Soon." Ink hoarsely bit out. He wanted to stop staring, but at the same time he wondered how long he'd have to wait to see another sight like that. She snapped her fingers when he didn't blink after a while.

"I think I should get dressed...then we can go?" She asked and he nodded. After He stepped out she pulled on her clothing and called him back in. Ink got Kane's collar and leash on, and he and Cally bid the white haired leader goodbye and headed out the house.

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By the time the duo made it to Varrock it was one o'clock in the after noon. They'd stopped at a dog park just out of the city to let Kane play after the walk. They spent about half an hour throwing a ball to have it returned and another half hour wrestling with the dog on the ground. Ink laughed when the small pup crashed himself into Cally and attacked her with a flurry of licks. She'd gotten her revenge when she tripped him and held him down for the white dog. He finally pulled himself away from the blonde girl and her new found partner in crime. They'd spent another fifteen minutes playing a mis-matched game of hide and seek where Ink would hide and Cally would follow with the dog. He'd proven to be too quick, and soon Cally and the poor pup were laid out on the ground panting.

After Ink picked up the now sleeping dog and called locrusilas via hand orb to teleport the dog back to base, he helped his blonde team mate up to her feet and they headed for the bank to get her account in order. There was a long line at all the booths, so they'd gotten in the shortest looking one and waited...and waited...and waited some more. Finally they'd made their way to the front and sat down with the teller.

"Hello, and welcome to varrock bank." the bleach blonde teller said from behind the glass. "My name is Melliena. How can I be of service?" she asked.

"Uhh...Yeah, we just need to get my friend here an account" The druid in white said. A few groans were heard from the people behind them.

"Ooooooook" she said as she began going through a filing cabenet under the desk. "Just fill out these papers and we'll get you all set up." She slid the papers and a pen to Cally, who sent a confused look to Ink. He picked up the pen and began filling out the important things.

"Actually sir, she needs to-" the teller was hushed by the druid.

"Ok Cally, now just pick a pin number and sign here." He pointed to a blank box and then marked an 'X' by a line.

The tan man handed Cally the pen and she began signing. Unfortunatly a loud slamming noise made her jump. By the time she looked to see what the problem was, It had already announced itself.

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"Ok everybody, 'eres the deal!" Said a large man dressed in black with a green crossbow in one hand said. "All you lucky peoples are gointa hand over all ya valuables!"

He said as be began walking across the bank. the crook already had everyone kneeling down, hands behind their head, because he said he'd 'Aim for the closest person's 'ead he will' if they didn't comply, and nobody really wanted to see the outcome of that today.

"Now, i'm going to walk by nice and slow, and one by one, all you lucky patrons are gointa drop ya valueables...Hey you! Where the da hell do ya think you're goin'?!" He yelled after a dark haired woman who had made it to the door, only to return later with another large man dressed in black who held a blue knife to her throat. He pushed her down and put his foot on her back.

"Haha! Good job there Vic!" The man with a crossbow said to the knife wielder. "Now, when I come by, you get ya loot ready." he said for the umpteenth time and stepped up to his first victims, two old people. The bastard felt he had to 'coax' their money out of them, and proceeded to kick them until he moved on to the next person.

In the back, Ink was seething. His good day had turned to shit, and now the guild was gonna want this done. He'd be in big shit if they found out he was at a robbery but didn't act. Their situation wasn't looking too good either. When the big man came around to search him, they'd find his I.D tags that signified him as a guild operative and well...They wern't too liked by crooks and criminals. Finally the big man stepped up to Ink who sent Cally a look. she nodded back to him and the big man addressed Ink.

"Hey there fag. Cough up ya earnin's before I gots ta beat ya." The big man said as he picked up the smaller druid with ease. Ink only smirked and swung his legs to kick the big man in the chin, who dropped him when he'd stumbled backwards. The crowd around them gasped and both archer and druid scrambled to their feet. Ink rushed the man, but before he made it three feet infront of the crossbow wielder, the other man picked up the same woman he had earlier and placed his blade where it once sat before.

"Take another step and she sprays blood." Ink looked back to Cally who kept a straight face. They shared a glance and Ink knelt down and put both arms behind his head again. Cally followed his example and the big man walked back up to Ink.

"You got alotta balls kicking ME-" He booted Ink in the chest; causing him fall backward. "-in the chin" He was about to bring his foot down on his chest again when the sound of metal sinking itself into meat rang through the room. Everyone looked at the woman in red who now had an outstretched arm. On the other side of the room a dropping sound was heard, and everyone looked.

The large man had a throwing knife stuck in his neck, and was now on the ground struggling to breath. This caught everyone's attention, even the big robber's. He looked at the woman in red but before he could open his mouth, Ink stood and unsheathed his red knife. In one fluid motion the druid litterally disarmed the man and cut his throat. The bigger man dropped as well and there was tension in the air. Nobody stood or spoke. They watched as the man in white pulled out a small crystal, spoke into it, and put it away. As soon as that was done, the corpses were teleported away. It was almost as if their existence was completely terminated. Everyone held their breath when the pair brushed themselves off and walked up to the tellers booth. The red girl picked up some papers off the floor.

"Now...about those forms..."

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Loc always had one simple rule, and that was 'Stick to Your Schedule'. Plan ahead and always make the best choices...and be ON TIME. Everything had a time in the white haired warriors world, even sleep management. Ironically, he'd been glued to the O.V for the last twenty minutes, which was the most he'd ever watch it during the day. There was an official looking woman infront of a bank with guards surrounding the building. The bottom of the screen read 'Live at Varrock east bank.' and through the window you could see a big burly man waving around a crossbow inside. Something caught his attention, and he'd walked over and picked up a man in white by his shirt only to fall backwards a moment later.

Loc was grinning like the cat that ate the canary. He knew damn well that was Ink in the bank. Where cally was he had no idea, but he'd been watching since the report came on and he'd be waiting for the blow that just came to the big man. He saw Ink look over to something that the camera couldn't see, but it did catch something thrown by a red woman's arm, which appearantly was like letting the leash go for a dog with Ink who's kill was censored with black boxes. He got to watch the pair dust themselves off when his screen cut to the old man who'd appeared not too long ago.

"Ah, Loc, I trust you were watching the news?" The old commander asked.

"Yes sir, I have..." He trailed off, not knowing if his higher-up was upset with his teammates assesment of the situation.

"They did wonderful, no?" The grey haired man was smiling. Locrusilas nodded and the old man continued.

"I must admit that I cannot wait to see the young girl's abilities, and that Ink's skill with close combat has greatly improved." The old man was still smiling.

"Well, my deepest apologies, locrusilas...just an old man reveling in his last few days" He chuckled and the dark skinned man raised an eyebrow. "I'll be going now, Locrusilas." He gave a salute and the orb faded. Loc wrote some things down and looked at the clock. When he told Cally that the guild leader couldn't wait to meet her she would scream.

He couldn't wait to relay the news to the girl who'd lightened up the base.

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meh, pretty short chapter. just a tiny, tiny, tiny, bit of action for everyone...where's it gonna go after this? keep an eye peeled for the next chapter to find out.


	7. Dismissed

Hey look, i'm back...prepare yourself for a jump through time and start reading.

chapter 9

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Ink and Cally came home from Varrock to most wonderful news. Their interference with the robbery was very appreciated, as the crooks had successfully knocked over countless banks. The chief of the guild had also seen the event, and positively commented on the duo's job. That night the squad had a wonderful feast prepared by Ink; who passed out on the couch with Kane when he was full and everyone headed to their rooms for a good nights sleep.

(...)

After that, the next four days continued on as normal as a guild member's life could be. They would awake to breakfast, get filled in on the day, do what needed to be done, and kick back for the rest of the day. insults were thrown and laughter was heard almost constantly from the base.

In those four days, Cally had made her spot in the house. Unofficially of course, but both ink and loc had admitted to doing everything in their power to ensure her spot. She would train on fighting sucessfully with the groups skills, and found that she did particularly well when Ink summoned a terrorbird for her to mount, when he started ranting about real combo attacks he summoned a mithril minotaur and loc instantly jumped onto the minoaurs left shoulder, while ink climbed up to the right. it dashed forward towards the dummy and the team jumped off. Cally watched in awe as the three attackers cut the legs, torso, and head of the dummy in one swift motion. she also found with training that she was easily able to deflect arrows off of the leaders swinging sword with decent accuarcy. Working well with the group was easy, and she had no doubt the three could work like a well oiled machine in field combat. Eventually the three would seperate and train on their own before heading back to the house/base.

Her staying around was a welcome to everyone, especially the dark skinned leader who'd awoke to cally up mopping the halls. the man had become attached to the blonde girl, almost to the point of brotherly. He almost seemed happy to push aside paperwork to make time for his 'sniper', whether it be talking or training. she'd learned that he'd gotten caught up in the falador massacre and was saved by ink, who he'd actually 'met' when the druid was assigned to the same squadren as the white haired warrior. She also found he wore glasses when he did his paperwork but took them off when ever the slightest risk of them breaking was near...namely Ink who had proken a pair before with his shenanigans.

On the second morning at the crack of dawn, a sand colored girl with shoulder length brown hair showed up at the base in a blue and white robe top that ended just below the center of her chest with an equally blue robe skirt that went to the ground. When Cally answered the door, the visitor introduced herself as Aberaii Zadd; who had been teaching Locrusilas magic since he joined the guild. They left into the training area for a couple hours, and the sounds of explosions reached all the way to the base. When the pair had finally returned, they shot straight to the dark man's office. The blonde archer went to see how training went, but left before she got to the door when she heard moans and pillow talk of every kind seeping through the door. Later, a messily dressed Locrusilas informed everyone that Aberaii would be staying with them until they went to the guild hq, where the brunnette mage worked as a receptionist. She quickly made good friends with Cally, as the blue mage was the only girl in the odd pair's group for the longest time. They laughed at the stupid things the men had done at one point or another, and. when Aberaii commented on the way Ink would challenge the warrior in a race down the hallway, only to have loc teleport to the finish line, the red woman laughed at a confused druid looking at the girls as if their heads were about to explode.

Speaking of Ink Splat, or Kin Sokat as Cally learned was his actual name, he'd been sticking near her like a hungry dog would follow anyone who fed it. He'd even gone so far as to ask her to stay in his room. At first she declined, saying that she really wasn't interested in staying in anybody else's room, but when Ink made explained about the 'happy empathy waves', she agreed. The next morning when their leader had commented on it, Ink grinned and gave a very vivid description of a sex scene that never happened, followed by Cally forcefully driving her fist into the back of the tan man's head and he was soon 'asleep' on the floor for a long nap. That didn't stop the midnight visits however, and by the third day cally would only go in her room when she changed, and that was only when Ink was in his room at the moment. The two would sit and talk ,occassionaly having themselves a cancer stick as ink put it bluntly once, until one or the other passed out. their relationship progressed quickly and the archer slowly started falling for the druid. Cally swore that when the man slept he purred, because unlike a snore that paused, his was a continous sound that lasted until she moved farther away or he woke up.

The entire fourth day was spent preparing for the long trip that was ahead of them. Ink was re-teaching Cally guild work basics while Loc was sending the message they'd be headed towards H.Q the next day, after which he was obliged to fill more paperwork. they all agreed to hit the hay early so they could make the trip on schedule.

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In no time at all the fifth morning was approaching, and Ink was shaking cally awake before the sun was up. He left he her to get ready and before she knew it the base/house was locked down and the four were off. Since the base was located outside of Ardougne, and the H.Q was on the outskirts of Pollyneavich, they planned to leave at five A.M, be at Varrock by nine, eat and leave by nine thirty to be at the shantay pass by a quater past ten. They would rest there until eleven, and then take a carpet ride to Pollineavich.

And what good time they made. Locrusilas kept them all on schedule, which caused Ink to complain because he wasn't done eating yet. By the time they reached Pollineavich, it was about two o'clock. The evaluation was at Three, so the group had a little time to spare. They visited a kebab vendor where they decided to get a little grub before continuing to the Guild H.Q.

(...)

"I still can't believe you ordered the super hot kebab, man." Ink said as he took a bite of his kebab. "That shit's enough to give a camel the runs."

"Doesn't stop it from being delicious" Was the reply the druid got from the white haired man. He bit into the vocano wrap and Ink swore the man was crying.

"You okay? Need some water?" the druid was waving the canteen in front of his leader's face. Locrusilas swallowed and shook his head, smiling at the tan man who'd walked away, yet another of his pranks defeated. Cally leaned over to aberaii and whispered something in her ear that caused her to blush, and that only served in sending the archer into a laughing fit

When they were done eating, the group headed out to the base. No sooner than they had reached the river, Ink pointed to a semi-sized building in the distance. It easily dwarfed their base back in ardougne, but compared to other guilds it still had room for growth. They'd started out at walking speed, but had to run when Aberaii poined to a six deep pack of wild desert cyotes.

Cally had managed to shoot two before they got close, but had to run when ink and loc cut down two more that snuck up behind them. With only four coyotes left, there was a bigger chance they'd walk away unscathed, but they still couldn't afford large injuries due to the evaluation...Damn guild MADE you look presentable. Ink tossed his knife and stuck a coyote in the neck, but when he tried to get close enough to retrive it another canine sunk it's fangs into the back of his leg. He whipped around with his knife and severed its jaw; causing it tear his leg a little more, but it was nothing that bandages wouldn't stop. During his small struggle Loc had managed to slice his cyote clean in half with his massive sword and Cally had fitted seven arrows into the other coyote. Aberaii had decided scorch to scorch a struggler that got back got back up and tried to run at the group. After the mage healed Ink's wound with lunar healing magic, which he had no idea she could do, the group pressed on towards the hq.

Their running away from the cyotes had served to get them closer to the HQ and soon l they found themselves at the large desert building. The guards at the front checked their I.D tags and let them through after they patted down Cally for suspicious items. Sector 58 checked in with the front receptionist for their meeting with the chief, while Cally began the paperwork needed for her evaluation. After about an hour's wait, the meeting between the two active operatives and the chief began.

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"Welcome operatives. Please sit down." the old chief motioned for Ink and Locrusilas to sit down in two red leather seats. Cally had to wait in the other room because she hadn't officially become a guild member yet and Aberaii had left earlier to go do 'receptionist things'.

"First off, let me say I am impressed with the way you finished your month's missions early, and without a third member at that." Ink flashed a smile while locrusilas had the business smile on. "You have honored the guild with the hard work you two have done. The lab also says they have learned great things from the dagganoth specimen you two sent in. For that, they have all donated a gracious amount to your account. Combined with the pay you two would normally get...well, your sector has recieved two million in funds this month." The white haired man's business facade almost faltered when his jaw slacked for a moment...Ink, on the other hand, had gripped his chest and sat back. He waved everyone off when he said he was fine and soon sunk back into his own business image. The old man coughed and spoke again.

"I would like to go over some reports before you leave. We have heard numerous reports of a new form of ghost lurking around in the wilderness above varrock, and would like your sector to check it out. Please have a report ready by next meeting." The wrinkled man handed them two files, one labeled 'Ghost' and the other labeled 'Pay'.

"Please send in the girl you brought along. I would like to talk to her on her way out. I will contact you when more missions fall into place. Other than that gentlemen I think we're done here." They all shook hands and the pair left the chief's office.

(...)

"Hey cally, the chief said he wants to talk to you before your evaluation." Ink said as he plopped down in the seat next to her, while Loc went off to find his little receptionist girl.

"Good, all this paper work has my wrist all knotted up. I could stand for a reason to take a break." She said as she set her clip board in the seat next to her and stood up to walk to the office door. Ink grabbed her wrist and looked up at her.

"Want me to go with you?" He asked and his blonde partner nodded. He could explain what the chief said if she got confused. He followed her into the room and they sat down in the same red leather chairs Loc and Himself had sat in earlier.

"Ink? You're back?" The chief said arching a grey eyebrow.

"With all due respect sir, im sure I could break things down a little bit for her, that way she doesn't get confused." ink said, the same business like manner taking over like earlier.

"Hm, I can see logic in that." He looked at cally. "I'll cut to the point. Guild work is dangerous, and there will be many times your life will be risked on a mission. Are you prepared to accept that?" She nodded. "Good. Now I understand from Locrusilas' recomendation that you have information on sigmund from lumbridge, is that right?" the old man asked.

"I know the man like the back of my hand." Cally said with a smile. The chief nodded and wrote something down.

"If it's not too much, could I send you on a special mission?" When she cocked her head slightly at the man, Ink motioned for him to elaborate. "Oh! Yes, we would like for you to perform a small recon mission on Sigmund, provided you know his whereabouts." He placed a thin file on the table. The archer thought it over, and eventually grabbed the file and flipped through it.

"...Yeah, I can do that...Sir." She finished after Ink tapped her shoulder.

"Good. Belive it or not Sigmund and his cronies have been a thorn in our side for quite some time." The blonde almost laughed when she remembered her now joke like attempts at assassinating her now partners only a week earlier. Looking back, most of her attemps were quite hilarous in the way either group would end up afterwards.

"The only other thing i would like to say is good luck with your assessment." The old man shook her hand and bid them both a good day. As soon as they walked out the door the chief's receptionist informed Cally her assessment was ready to begin and Ink led her to the guild field where all evaluations took place.

As they made their way down they hall way to the training area, they met up with their other two partners, both of whom looked as if they'd been waiting for a small while. After a small celebration over Loc's convincing the chief to allow Abaraii a temporary spot in their sector, they walked a little further and saw three guild captians, two male and one female; all identified by the royal purple and gold guild capes. Appearantly they were all the judges of Cally's assessment. The captains waved for the four-cell sector and Cally took a step forward about to begin the walk down the hallway eager for her test.

**BLAAAAM!!! BLAAAAM!!! **

Explosions were heard all around as the whole building shook. Cally jumped back towards her group as the alarms all around the building went off.

**"WARNING! WANRING! ENEMY TROOPS HAVE INTRUDED AND SURROUNDED THE BUILDING. ALL AVAILABLE OPERATIVES REPORT TO THE MAIN HALL FOR A QUICK BRIEFING! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!"** Immeadiatly after the alert the group all had their weapons at the ready, albeit for Abaraii who had no weapons in favor of magic. Another deafening blast was heard at the end of the hallway and the squad watched as the three captains from before were blown away by the explosion.

"We have to move, NOW!" Loc yelled as hobgoblins of all sizes began filing in. Cally reached into her pack, pulled out a red chinchompa and launched it. The explosion tore through many of the assaulters and bought them a little time to escape. They took off down the hall way only to come upon another triplet of hobgoblins. Locrusilas cut down two while Aberaii shot an earth missle at the one Loc missed. Ink took the time to summon a barker toad and again the group was off. The leader motioned for them to take the next left hallway and they came upon five more hobgoblins who had just gotten done ending four guild operatives. Cally stuck one that tried to run up with two arrows while Ink's barker toad shot a compressed air bomb at the three who failed to realize what happened in time. They ran past the freshly shreaded hobgoblins and opened the door to the main hall. Out of all the guild operatives at the base at the time of the attack, which according to the records was one hundred and fourteen, only twelve and the chief had made it to the main hall; locrusilas' team included. Everyone quickly set up a defense and the discussion about the situation at hand.

"We need to eliminate all the intruders from the base-" A member with two old looking war hammers spoke up but was cut off by a woman with a blue scimtar

"Do you really think we can recover this base with only 12 people? sorry, chief." she said as she looked to the chief. he nodded.

"We NEED to evacuate. That seems the best option." Said a gnome as he stood at the ready with an arrow half knocked. It was locrusilas' turn to speak now.

"I'm not gonna let a few hobgoblins destroy our base." he said. "I don't know about you guys but i'm loyal to my guild, and if I die, then so be it. I died an honorable death." the white haired leader finished

"I'm with him. If this place goes i'm sure i'd be outta work for good. Gotta stay working." Ink said as he dismissed his barker toad in favor of a spirit wolf. The others were looking at him strange, knowing there wasn't much a wolf could do now. The guild leader nodded at their comments as he unsheathed a short sword from his cane.

"It's decided then. The situation looks grim but i'm willing to stay and fight for the guild." The old man stood infront of the group. "I won't stop you if you value your lives and wish to leave. In fact, those who would like to attempt to leave, do so now." Immeadiatly five of the twelve operative bolted for the door, not looking back once. "Hm...now that that's cleared, the eight of us will split into two man teams and attempt to liberate the base wing by wing. Desma and Alem, take the north wing." He motioned at the man with war hammers and the scimtar lady. they saluted and stood by their door ready to begin. "Gepetto." The gnome looked up at the chief. "You will accompany me as we liberate the west wing. Locrusilas, you and Ink take the southern hall-" he was cut short by the druid.

"Sir, I would like to take Cally with me into the south hall. Consider this her...Evaluation?" The chief thought it over.

"You're lucky you're in good terms with me, Ink. I will approve your request. Locrusilas, take Abaraii with you and take back the east wing...This may be the last time we speak, so I want you to know i'm proud of everyone here today. Survive, and we just might have to see about some bonuses." Everyone chuckled at the chief's small joke, the tension of the moment temporarily melting away.

"Dismissed!"

And with that word everyone tore down the doors leading to what might be their last stand.

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Hi. Back again. You might find yourself asking ", who is aberaii?" well, she's:

Aberaii Zadd: A-ber-E Zad : age:22 : a receptionist for the guild, but don't let that fool you. this woman's got enough magical prowess to fry you with a thought, and then bring you back from the brink of death with healing magic...just to do it again. she and Loc tend to spend...*ahem*..."time" with each other...think something's going on with the two?

yes...the shit has begun to hit the fan. you might be asking your self, "why stay in a place where you might die?". well i'll tell you to go read some of the earlier chapters. you'll see everyone's reasons for needing the guild. Stay tuned to find out if the last few can reclaim the guild.


	8. Trivial Matters

Quick! Continue with the violence!

Chapter 8: Trivial Matters.

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WHACK! WHACK! WHACK!

"Thats ten!" Desma, the man with the war hammers, said. "You might end up paying for drinks tonight!" He laughed and sent his war hammer to collide with another of the orange goblins. "Eleven!" He boasted. His light blue chain mail was slowly turning red from all the carnage. He had numerous cuts over his arms and legs, and his spikey black hair was sticking to his face from a cut on his head. He jumped on a goblins face and bounded off to land behind his partner. He knocked away a spear headed for his face and slammed the attackers face with a hammer. "Twelve no-"

**"VORTEX SABRE!!!"**

Yelled Alem; the blue haired, scimtar wielding woman behind him. she at a hobgoblin only to have it jump away and fall apart at the torso when it landed. She swung twice more at the monsters who were a good four feet away, and at least three fell with some sort of wound. Desma could hear the smirk on the rune plated woman, with a rune skirt to match, when she said "Fourteen, drinks on you." He blocked an over head swing and pushed the monster back. "Heh, thats what you think." He planted his boot in a monster's chest while raising his hammer. When it was on the ground, he brought the war hammer down directly on its head sending it's contents everywhere. He jumped with great power to another goblin with both war hammers raised and repeated the process.

"REVENGE OF THE BARBARIAN!!!"Faster and faster he went, until at one point ten goblins fell intstanteanously and their heads splattered. He jumped back to his comrade panting heavily. "Twenty...*pant*...twenty-four. Hey, toss me an energy potion." He asked his partner who swung on a goblin and tossed him his requested item. In a fluid motion he flicked off the cork with his thumb and guzzled the contents of the vial. You could see his strength returning from the attack that drained him, and when it was gone he chucked the glass vial at a goblins face and smashed his face when he was stunned.

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Slowly the pair cleared out room after room and hallway after hallway of goblins, and it was begining to show. Alem's rune plate had been hit by an ogre and crushed. She cut the top of the ogre's head off when she recovered and discarded the spent armor, now in a skin tight black undershirt. Desma nearly lost his arm when a crazed goblin came at him with a battle axe and swung. He blocked it, but it slipped and dug itself into his shoulder. Needless to say the goblin lost everthing above the shoulders after a rescue from Alem. The duo were currently running down a hallway from a pack of coyotes that the hobgoblins had unleashed.

"Quick! Through the door!" Alem pointed and Desma barged the door open and shut it in the kanines' muzzles. He barred the door shut with a chair and locked it.

"Heh, now we can take a short break, right Alem?" He looked over when he got no response "Alem?"

The blue haired woman was slumped against the wall. Looking at the blood in her hand she coughed up.

"Looks like that ogre...took a little bit more out of me than...*cough*...I thought" She said as she looked over to her partner before falling into a mad coughing fit and finally fainting.

"Hey, stay awake!" Desma ran over and, after he woke her back up, had her drink a restore potion he'd pulled out of his pack. "I'm gonna contact help on the hand orb." He pulled out the cracked pink marble sized orb and spoke into it. "Hey! We need help over here! Alem's got an injury and we can't keep the enemy off of us for long." He looked up at the door that was still clanging like it may come open at any minute. "I repeat, north sector requires help!" He'd waited as the orb fuzzed a little bit. A voice was heard not two seconds later.

"O_k! east team...on it's way A.S.A.P! We just got...to clear an-_" The line went dead. Desma was relieved however, as he heard that help was on its way, and it was the team from the east wing. That meant that Aberaii, who was probably who he talked to considering the femenine voice, would be here and could help with her lunar magic.

"Help's on its way Alem, just wait a little longer." She smiled at him and she slowly fell into darkness again. "Alem!! Aleeem!!!" Desma shook the woman, but when that failed he tried the orb again, attempting to get it to work but to no avail. All the man could do now was wait and hope help got to them fast enough.

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Locrusilas and Aberaii were liberating the east wing with ease. The warrior ran in swinging causing a diversion while his partner sat back to launch magic blasts at unsuspecting goblins. Locrusilas would jump out of the crowd when he got overwhelmed, calling for aberaii to unleash an enormous blast that allowed locrusilas jump jump back in to finish off any strugglers. They had repeated this process when ever possible but eventually the goblins wisened up and targeted the brunette mage. She saw them circle her and began to charge up a spell that would back them up a little bit, but stopped when the suited man jumped beside her, sheathed his sword on his back and grabbed her arms.

"Charge your magic to your feet!" He yelled and she complied. the blue mage's feet began to glow a greenish yellow, and Loc began swinging her in a circle. Once they got up to speed she began kicking the monsters in the chest whenever she was swung in their direction and was successfully blowing baseball sized holes through them. Locrusilas let go and she landed feet first onto a wall. Using her enchanted feet, she kicked off the wall back in Locrusilas' direction and he jumped out of her path as she barrelled into multiple goblins while protecting herself with a barrier. She flipped to steady herself and landed on the opposite side of the hallway while loc fell back next to her.

"That was awesome" The dark warrior commented as he re-drew his sword. Aberaii simply smiled and started launching fire balls at the remaining goblins who had somehow gotten back up when her hand orb started talking. She told locrusilas to cover her for the moment.

"_Need...lp...Ale...injur...We ca...nmy...r long._" she frowned. they still had to eliminate the enemy in the east wing before the goblins regrouped and counter attacked. She listened closely as the orb spoke up again. "_I rep...north wi...res...help!_" she heard fuzz and decieded she should talk before the line droped.

"Ok! East team will be on its way A.S.A.P.! We just got another room to clear out and we'll give you back up!" She waited for a response and almost took off for the north wing when nothing came, but Locrusilas motioned for her to get ready to rid the rest of the east wing of the attackers. They stood on both sides of the door and on the count of three they both busted in launching fire balls at anything that moved. Unfortunatly, three ogres in the room that had mercinaried themselved to the goblins had either dodged or deflected the fireballs. When the assault was over one ran forward and gripped up Abaraii in a bear hug. The brute squeezed while the white haired man ran foward and cut the other two ogre's down before they could fire their gigantic bows. He silently prayed that his partner could hold out for a few more seconds while he eliminated the threat.

Abaraii felt her back getting ready to give. The ogre had been squeezing her so hard that blood was rushing to her face and her back was begining to give sickening cracking noises. She noticed locrusilas run foward to cut down the other two before her back gave one final pop and her vision blackened. Locrusilas turned just in time to see his receptionist go limp and slump to the floor. He screamed at the giant who started laughing.

"You..." He started walking towards the giant. "Did you just...Did you...RRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!" He ran foward and swung his blade down at the giant who'd caught his blade in his hands. the ogre kicked Locrusilas in the stomach and sent him flying into a wall. the leader rebounded and began launching slicing air wave after air wave at the giant's hand untill he dropped his blade. Loc rolled, picked it up, and moved to slice upward but the giant sidestepped and threw a punch. Locrusilas dodged and swung his sword down, lopping off the giants hand. The orge reeled back in pain but quickly recovered and swatted the sword that was rushing at him with his good hand. the large monster rushed locrusilas and picked him up in the same bearhug that he used on Aberaii.

"Hur...I's gonna gets paid reel gud for da hyumansie's heads." He chuckled and began applying more pressure to Locrusilas' back.

"Not...today...you fat fucker!" On that last note, the dark skinned man's normally chocolate eyes flashed grey, and he released a blast from his body that blew apart the ogre's chest and tore off his arms. After locrusilas was dropped and he pulled himself to his feet, he limped over to Abaraii and touched her neck, feeling for a pulse.

"Loc..." The brunnete had mumbled into the floor. "...I can't feel my legs." She strained out.

"It's gonna be ok. We're gonna get out of this and im gonna get you to a doctor..." She nodded head and struggled to move her hand to her injury to apply healing magic. It wouldn't completly fix an injury like that, but it'd do enough to stop the pain.

"What about the north wing team?" she asked through tense breath.

"Don't worry, i'll take care of them when I get back. I promise you that." The dark warrior said.

After the majority of her pain was gone, he pricked his finger and let the blood drop on the floor. she watched and as soon as he was sure the spot was big enough, he teleported to Varrock with her in tow. It was there that he dropped her off at a nearby emergency hospital and went back the the hq using his blood as a locator for a teleport. He'd have done that earlier, but it always takes so much energy to infuse the blood on the floor with magic, let alone get back to the small spot.

Wearily, he made his way back to the main hall where he'd depart off to the north wing. He had his word to keep after all.

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Ink and Cally were having a 'teensy' bit of trouble. Their wing just so happened to house the information section. For some reason there was something in here that the goblins were after, and they'd beefed up security to ensure they'd find it. After Ink blew away a few goblins with his spirit wolf on their way to the grand hall, where all the information the guild had collected was stored, they'd crossed paths with a bloody and bruised gepetto who had informed them that the chief was cut down during battle to give the small gnome a chance to retreat, but the little guy had gotten stuck in the back with about 4 ogre arrows. They'd traveled a small ways together before the gnome eventually lost his struggle against death. Ink and Cally prayed for the two who gave their lives in the name of the guild.

When they'd reached the grand halls balcony, they saw about thirty ogres, and fifty goblins; about thirty of which were going through the books on various levels on shelves. Ink stuck his head up to take a good look over the balcony on the second floor and saw a red hobgoblin. he looked just like all the others, except this one stood upright and directed the goblins in their raid.

"Appearantly the red goblin over there is leading the whole operation." Ink said to Cally, who was currently knocking back an arrow. "If we can take him out, i'm sure the rest of the enemies with either flee or surrender." he informed her as she discreetly took aim, gold hawk eyes replacing sky blue. She fired at the red goblin and ducked back down, waiting for the sound of an arrow sinking into flesh.

"_You humes can come down. I sensed you in here earlier, but didn't think you'd be dumb enough to attack head on._"

Ink and Cally both stood up and looked at the red goblin. Unfortunatly eighty-one pairs of eyes were looking back. Cally lined up another shot and fired, only to have the red hobgoblin dissappear and come back behind ink, pressing the arrow he'd caught earlier to his throat.

"_Allow me to introduce myself. I am Red...just Red...now surrender...or die_" He emphazized the death part by drawing blood with the arrow. Cally dropped her hawk eyes in surrender with her hands up, but Ink threw his head back into the goblins face and ripped it's arm away from his neck. the goblin leader snapped his fingers and almost instantly two ogres appeared behind Cally and Ink holding them down.

"_You know, I never understood why you humes care so much about trivial matters like territory and revenge. do you have any idea how many of your guild we wasted away today?" _The leader goblin cackled and ink spit at him. he wiped off the spit, knelt down, and grabbed ink by the face.

"_I was willing to let you live..."_ The red leader hissed. "_But no longer...guards-" _He was cut off by a yell."WOLF SCROLL: HOWL!!!"

The druid bellowed and a loud howling noise sent all the agressors flying into the wall. The goblin leader was the first back on his feet and snapped his fingers for a cue for all of his lackeys to attack the human pair.

"Ink! we have to retreat!" Yelled Cally who was firing arrow after arrow at the advancing monsters.

"No! i'm not done yet!" He ran over to his spirit wolf and placed his hand on its back.

"If stay any longer were done for!" She stressed. The blonde had backed up to the point of litterally being crunched into the corner with ink and his wolf. She watched a six pointed star appear on the wolf under ink's hand, and soon everyone in the room was blinded by a bright light as ink and the wolf floated into the air towards each other."SUMMONING ARMOR: PELT OF THE WOLF!!!"

The animal man yelled and the light stopped. Ink had re-appeared with a blue and white cloak, and blue and white fur spread from his hands in a flame like manner up to his elbows. His hands gained claws that he was currently flexing. Everyone and everything in the room was now staring at the man who appeared as he just merged with the wolf that was in the room earlier.

"Red...i'll tell you like this..." he dashed foward and cut the first few rows of goblins with his claws. He landed and looked at the red monster "We 'humes' as you put it-" He pulled back his fist. Air started twisting and twirling around his hand, ruffling his arm fur. "-are indeed trivial. I myself could care less about things like territory, but the revenge...thats natural. you fuck with my pack, and i'll come back, and i'll slaughter your whole god damned clan." He swung his hand down and his claws made a howling noise as they cut the air."HOWL STRIKE!!!"

He telled as blades of air sliced forward, decimating numerous goblins and ogres. After the attack only red and five of the ogres stood.

"PART UNE: HAWK EYES!"

cally's eyes turned gold again as she knocked back her bow with three arrows and let loose at one of the ogres.

"PART DEUX: SNAPSHOT!" She yelled as she repeated the action four more times and soon all the ogres found themselves fitted with three arrows dead center of the chest. Only red was left standing. The archer knocked back one final arrow.

"PART TROIS: POWERSHOT!" Cally let the arrow fly at devistating speeds towards red's head and he barely dodged it. When he stood back up he found he had a cut on the top of his head.

"You see Red? In the end...you lose." Ink looked Red in the eye who grinned. the monster pulled a throwing axe from behind him and launched it at Cally who had no time to dodge and it caught her in the shoulder, only an inch or two from her neck. She screamed and fell to the ground in pain.

"_Ahh...but you see wolfman, arrogance is always a hume's downfall. I could finish her right now if I wante-" _Redwas cut off when he had to pull out his dual short swords to block Ink's claw swipe. Red tried to counter by bringing up his left sword in an attempt to impale Ink, but the druid jumped backand red threw his right sword at him. It nicked him in the arm but he dodged it for the most part. The goblin leader took the time to lay a smoke screen perform a twisted version of the lunar clone spell. Ink was caught off guard when three goblins each holding a steel sword ran at him. He managed to block two swords, but the third strike slashed him in the chest and forced him to retreat a little more. They rushed him again and he took three more slashes on his right arm and side.

"_You see?!!?_" All three of the Reds yelled. "A_ll that talk earlier just to end up feeling cold steel."_ All the reds hissed a laugh and and advanced on the weary Ink, who was standing infront of cally ready to either fend them off or die trying. They got about six feet in front of Ink before a sudden quake of the room had caused them to stumble, one of which fell and the wolf druid capitalized and clawed the faux goblin in the back of the neck. He poofed into ash and when Ink looked up he saw Locrusilas driving his red sword through another faux goblin as it too turned to ash. Red took advantage of the sword's weight and kicked Locrusilas in the face while he parried three more of ink's swipes.

Ink and red kept trading blows. Ink slashed vertically, and Red sidesteped and cut horizontally. The wolf man bent back and delivered a kick to the goblin's gut, who slammed into a war hammer thrown just right by none other than Desma. Locrusilas saw his opportunity and came swinging down, and for a small moment Red and Locrusilas were engaged in a small sword fight. Ink dashed behind the goblin for a swipe at his legs while his partner swung at his torso, but the red leader flipped between the two swords and delivered a kick to both men before hopping away to be met by Desma. The black haired man pounded away the goblin with a long stream of crushing blows. The final hit was a boot that sent red back over to Locrusilas who planted his sword in the ground, using it as leverage to deliver a powerful double kick. That sent the monster flying in Ink's direction, who crouched low and flip kicked the goblin high into the air. All three men jumped above the red beast, weapons and claws poised for a killing blow. He rocketed into them as their combined weight drove the monster back into the ground.

Red laid on the ground, coughing up blood from numerous punctured and broken things. Ink walked over to the dying monster and leaned in his face. He gripped him by the throat and let his claws sink into the monsters flesh. He leaned close to the goblins ear and whispered.

"This is why you don't FUCK-" He dug his claws deep into the monsters throat. "-with the guild." And in one fluid motion he ripped out the red leaders wind pipe. After the goblin stopped twitching, Ink looked around and assessed the damage. Cally had a wound that was very close to being a fatal blow, Loc had been crushed along with Abaraii; who got the whole duration of the ogre's attack. Loc was ok, and he assured the rest of them that the mage, along with Alem had been taken the Varrock hospital. Ink finally let go of his summon armor and quickly dropped from the pain. The transformation nullified alot of the pain, untill he dropped it. He took a ragged breath and stood back up, then he, along with Desma and Locrusilas, walked over to Cally's knocked out form. She had passed out from blood loss, but Desma said 'He'd seen this kinda case before' and that she would be fine if she got to a hospital in time. Ink looked up to his dark skinned partner. The look alone begged him to teleport one last time. Locrusilas huffed and grabbed onto everyone, and in a haze of purple light the four were off to varrock hospital.

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yeah ok! how was that?! i know what you're thinking. you're probably thinking that's the end of it. only for a small moment child...there is always a small calm before every storm, and lets just say for a small moment were gonna hit the eye of the storm. also, if you want pictures as to what Desma and/or Alem look like, i can post pictures of them. i just didn't take a pic of them already because they're gonna be gone for a long time.


	9. My Hoodie

Hello again! After a semi-long break, I return...This time with steamy goodness. If you don't get down with that then about half way through i recommend you stop reading. There's no more information to be had once you're HALFWAY through. More chapters are already in the making so hang around, and R&R.

Chapter 9: My Hoodie.

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Ink ran into the Varrock emergency hospital carrying a passed out Cally with Desma and Locrusilas hot on his heels. The hospital staff had checked her in, and after she was stitched up the doctor adminestered some healing magic and signed cally off with a clean bill of health. Alem was already healed and ready to leave with Desma. He caught Loc on the way out with his partner and slipped him a number.

"Give me a call on the handorb anytime you need anything." He said to the warrior and shook his hand. With that the war hammer man and the blue haired woman were gone, headed for god knows what.

The only truly unlucky one was Aberaii. The bear hug had caused one of her spinal disks to force its way out of place. She would go into surgery tonight and recover for a day. Loc was visiting with her at the moment, and since Ink knew he'd be there for a while the druid left the dark man and his receptionist in private.

"How does she look?" A blonde archer had asked ink as he closed the door to the mage's room..

"Not good." He answered. "She's really doped up, and while he was in there the doctor said that even after surgery Aberaii might not be able to move on her own." Cally's hopeful facade had faltered.

"Loc's not holding up much better either..." The tan druid said after a moment. "With his fiance in the hospital, plus the fact that we just may be outta work...Well, its taking it's toll on the man...What?" He asked after he caught Cally staring at him.

"Fiance? I didn't know they were engaged..." She trailed off.

"Yeah...He proposed to her about three months ago. Right in the middle of the HQ." His faced dropped even farther remembering the building was only a fraction of its former self when they'd left it. "The chief's dead, along with countless others... what would have caused the assault like that? It was set up with efficiency in mind, so they were after something..." the druid pondered. He was cut from his thoughts as the dark leader exited the brunette's room.

"Hey...I'm gonna be staying here for tonight..." Ink could feel the worry the man had built up. "Don't worry though, the hospital staff actually has a wing designed for over night guests. Here, take these-" He reached in his now bloody rune pouch and pulled out a few of the pebble sized stones. "Get yourself home and take a well deserved rest. We'll discuss what's gonna be happening tomorrow afternoon." Without another word the man walked back in to the room, leaving the archer and druid to get themselves home.

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When the two arrived at the HQ, Ink walked into the leader's office. He had already told Cally that she could go ahead and get some sleep if she wanted, and she did exactly that. The tan man had already found what he was looking for, which would be special instructions regarding the death of the guild chief. Ink was actually shocked at what had happened. The old man had 'died' before, but it was always faked to get the enemy thinking that the guild had dissolved as was customary with a leader's death. Now though, it wasn't an enemy bragging they had scored a kill...It was a report from a fellow guild operative who had personally witnessed the old man's downfall. He took a swig of the booze Locrusilas always kept in the drawer of his desk and began reading.

'_In the event of guild death...in event of raid...ah, here we are.'_ He though to himself and turned the small stapled stack of papers to the correct page.

'I_n the event of the death of the guild chief...yada yada yada...fake death...yada yada yada...huh?" _The dirt eyed man had to double take at the phrase.

'_In the event of the actual death of the guild chief, ownership of the guild is immeadiatly transferred to the next available guild operative from the previous guild chief's blood line. Should they turn down the position, the job will move further down the line...should all applicants turn down the job, ownership of the guild is headed to the operative with the highest stock shares at time of guild chief's death." _He was shocked again. the man honestly didn't know if the chief HAD descendents...combine that with the richie fucks in the guild who just loved to wave around cash and the guild would turn to shit in no time. The poor man was half tempted to just walk away from guild work. He couldn't though...he needed the money and access the guild work brought in. He never would have gotten as stong as he was without it. Ink needed to be strong...strong enough to overthrow a whole kingdom...

That's exactly what he planned to do.

"Wait...what if the guild chief position...I could..." He took out his notebook and scribbled down a few notes before taking another swig from the bottle of vodka. Eventually a knock was heard at the door. Ink hastily closed his notebook and shoved it in his pocket before yelling for the knocker to come in. Cally opened the door and walked in; the druid's attention was immeadiatly caught.

"Hey. Loc just called. He said Aberaii was awake and that he'd be home with her tomorrow...What's wrong?" She finally asked after a pause. Ink regained his composure after a moment and spoke.

"Nice legs." The druid said with a dry throat and a grin. The girl had come bounding into the room wearing nothing but one of ink's spare white hoodies. It was too big for her though and it ended at her upper thigh.

"Yup. All my clothes were either dirty or bloody now, sooo..." She said nonchalontly. The blonde came over and sat on his lap at the desk. Ink's cool facade dropped and his face got as red as a tan person's face could get. He could handle when she slept next to him at night because hell, she was clothed. But for god's sake, when you come up to a man dressed only in HIS clothes...There was a limit god dammit! Ink took another swig of the vodka however, and did his best to remain calm and collected.

"Whatcha lookin' at?" She asked when she noticed all the papers spread over the desk.

"Just-*ahem*- Just some papers concerning what do to when the chief passes on." He finished and Cally stole the bottle from his hand. She took a few gulps, set it on the table, and quickly began to go through the papers. Ink was going through hell right now. Here was a blonde, sitting on his lap, leaning foward in HIS hoodie. The man's blood was rushing towards a certain spot, and it took every ounce of willpower to reverse the flow to avoid creeping the girl out.

"It says we wait for a call..." She finally spoke after a small moment.

"Yeah, I saw that too. Normally the guild chief'll fake his death, so the enemy will think the guild dissolves, but...you heard what geppetto said. He actually saw the chief die." The grim memory overtook the room for a moment before Cally spoke up again.

"So now what?" She asked.

"We wait." Ink said. He took out a cigarette and lit up. After exhaling he continued. "I'm gonna talk to Loc when he gets back and we'll figure out what to do from there...Hey...You okay?" He asked. She was crying. He hated when women cried because he always felt like he was at fault.

"I...I thought we were...gonna die...I thought we all did...I remember getting hit-" She grabbed her shoulder where the axe red had thrown connected. "-and before I blacked out I thought we were all gonna die..." Sobs wracked her body and she felt stupid. She was crying over the same people she had been been trying to kill, but that was before she found the actual worth of people. Everyone had their own ideals and it just took a small beating before she realized that. Well, a small beating and two people she was sure she could trust her life to.

Ink leaned foward and pulled the archer by her waist back to him. He held her like that for a minute but she still cried. He told her over and over that he wasn't going to die anytime soon, and that he if had anything to say about it neither would anyone else. Her sobs quieted but the tears never stopped. Ink finally did the last thing he could think of at the moment. He tilted her head over and up with his hand and softly kissed her on the lips. Cally's eyes grew wide for all of a moment before her eyes closed and she moved her hand up to his neck. Ink moved back and she could taste the vodka from his lips.

"Feel better?" He asked, face still red. Cally could feel his heart thumping and she nodded. He reached for the bottle of vodka and took a swig, then grinned at Cally and she blushed. He handed her the bottle but she used his arm for leverage to swing her legs around to sit on either side of his legs. She wrapped her arms around his neck and crushed his lips with hers.

Now it was Ink's turn for a shock. He dropped the bottle however, and gripped both sides of her waist. The tan man licked her lips asking for entrance and she complied. Their tounges battled for dominance; minutes passing like hours. They pulled away for air and the animal man attacked her pulse point in her neck with nips and licks. Cally pulled off her hair scrunchie that held her pony tail in place, and her hands immeadiatly attacked his skull cap. She started tracing the designs with her finger, occassionally making small noises when Ink bit in the the crook of her jaw and neck. The blonde's fingers started towards the back of his head and hit something underneath the beanie like hat.

"Kin?" She asked. He grunted at the name she had stuck with calling him since the HQ incident.

"Hm?" Was his response. She ran her finger over the object under the hat.

"What's this?"

"See for yourself." He replied and tilted his head down so she could take his hat off. She had never seen him with his hat off come to think. The girl pulled the skull cap off and was surprised to find two long brown triangles laid back in short, dark brown hair. She squealed and Ink winced.

"Not so loud. I wear the skull cap so noises don't hurt as bad." He spoke.

"So...you don't have human ears but..." She trailed off and looked at him. He blushed, but brought his ears up to full length.

"BUNNY EARS!" one squealed

"...bunny ears...NOT SO LOUD!" the other mumbled, then yelled. Cally's apology came in the form of scratching at the base of his ears. The bunny druid's eyes began fluttering and Cally swore his foot started kicking.

"So let me get this straight..." She trailed off again as her hand moved higher up his ears. She felt his arm twitch and she continued. "...You're a bunny druid-" He grunted "-Who can fuse with wolves?" He grunted again and she giggled. He would have filled her in that the wolf was just the easiest to merge with, but ears itched really bad when you kept them under a hat all day. The blonde pulled one of his long ears down and lightly bit the tip with her lips. Ink inhaled sharply and buried his face in her neck again. She reached up and did the same thing to the other ear and the tan man grabbed the zipper of her hoodie and pulled it down half way, mildly shocked that she had no bra on. He kissed his way down to her chest and attacked her left mound, bringing up his right hand to tease her unattended side. She moaned and arched her back into him, choosing to let go of his ears in favor of the back of his head. The man licked around her nipple until it was erect then lightly bit down; his right hands first finger and thumb performing the same actions as his tounge and teeth. Cally let out a half scream half moan when he bit down, and he switched breasts, bringing his left hand up where his mouth was. He performed the same actions and all through out the bunny man's teasing of the blonde's chest, Cally was grinding herself into Ink. His shorts were begining to give from the buldge that was forming, and when he bit down on a hardened peak again, she bucked particularly hard and the tan man lost it.

He picked her up, cleared off the desk with a sweep of his arm, and laid her down on the desk. The druid unzipped her hoodie down all the way and leaned over her. he attacked her mouth while his right arm teased her right tip. She moaned into the kiss and again the pair's tounges battled. Ink pulled his right hand away and chose to relocate it on her red lacy underwear. He used his first and middle finger and began to spell his whole name on her sex through the underwear. 'K-I-N.' He moved his fingers slowly, enjoying the long groan she gave with each letter. the man finished the N and she wrapped her legs around his waist, urging him to finish spelling his name. He spelled out his last name, S-O-K-A-T, and after that his hand was crushed between himself and the archer when she clamped her legs around him harder, pressing their hips together. He growled in her ear and began nibbling along her jaw line while undoing his belt. Her hands roamed over ink's now exposed chest, memorizing every muscle, scar, and inch on the druid's torso. She heard his shorts hit the ground and knew exactly what she wanted was on its way. She squirmed to get out of her red lacy panties; something the bunny druid was more that willing to help with. He tossed the garment away, along with his boxers, and gripped Cally's hip. He placed himself at her entrance and leaned in her hear to speak to her in a low, lust-ridden voice.

"You sure?" Ink asked, his breath hot in her ear. The archer nodded and pushed into him asking for release.

"One more question-" He breathed. "-you a virgin?" She shook her head and he moved away from her, taking her legs in a strong grasp.

"Good." he smirked and in one quick motion he'd flipped her, letting go of her legs which were now holding her up while her body leaned over the desk. The tan man's hands reached out to grab her ass and pulled her back to him as he sunk is erection in her to the base. She pushed herself up off the desk and began to meet the druid's thrusts.

"NNNNNnnnnhhh" Was the sound she had made. The small office was soon filled with the sound of flesh meeting flesh and moans as Ink drilled away at the blonde, animalic urges taking over as he took her roughly on the desk. He leaned over her back to speak in her ear again, one hand coming up to lightly grasp her throat.

"You like being my bitch, don't you?" He growled out and she tilted her head to look at the man who was claiming her, moaning her agreement. He smashed her mouth with his lips and without a moment wasted the two were exploring each other's mouths. The hand that had originally come up to grip her throat left, sliding it's way down the blonde's body before stopping at her clit. Ink began teasing the small jewel and Cally moaned into the kiss. He pulled away and moved back to her ear, exiting her tight hole and stopping the actions he was performing on the blonde's body. She groaned in frustration and Ink spoke into her ear.

"What do you want?" she could hear the smirk.

"Please...don't tease..." Her body was stiff. She could feel herself reaching her peak before Ink stopped and if he didn't finish the job soon...

"You gotta tell me." He cupped her warmth. "Tell me what you want."

"...You...I want you." Her muscles tensed as the animal man's finger circled her sensitive spot.

"What do you want?" He asked again and she moaned as he pressed his head against her lips.

"I wa-*pant* I want you to...fuck me." She moaned out and he slid himself in a small ways before stopping.

"...Be more descriptive." He demanded and licked the edge of her ear.

"GOD DAMMIT! FUCK ME! FUCK ME WITH YOUR COCK UNTIL I CUM AND THEN KEEP FUCKING ME! I DON"T CARE JUST-" She was cut short as the same man she was just yelling at pushed her back down, lifted her ass up in the air slightly, and roughly entered her. His hand continued its earlier ministrations to her bead, doubling her pleasure as the altered position caused Ink to hit her G-spot everytime he slammed into her. The warm feeling in her stomach turned into a wildfire and before long the small moans from before had turned into loud cries of pleasure. The heat in her stomach began expanding and the blonded attempted at making words.

"I-I-I'm..." she struggled to get the words out, but the druid must have understood what she was getting at because he quicked his pace, his grunts growing loud enough to match her screams. He slammed his shaft in one last time before both operatives reached their orgasm. Cally's eyes rolled back and her muscles tightened, along with her inner walls which were attempting to milk the man for all he had. Spent, Ink leaned foward against HIS archer, the purring noise kicking back up as he finally caught his breath. Cally, on the other hand, was still panting as if she ran around the world. He pulled out, the action earning another grunt from the pair, and began massaging her breasts again, retreving another moan from the blonde. She finally caught her breath again and asked a question as the man's purring noise rang in her ear when he leaned close to her again.

"So...Is this something enough to live for?" she met his eyes.

"Considering it's you with me, yeah...But...I'm still planning on acting on my plans. I'll just have to fight harder to make sure I get a castle for you to live in." He said and smiled.

"No...we'll have to fight for the castle that we're gonna live in." She responded, and his hand left her mound.

"Then you'll help me when the time comes?" He asked, his voice hopeful and shaky.

"I thought long and hard about it, but...yeah...I'll help y-" She was cut off when he devoured her lips, fingers returning to tease her nipple. He ate the scream she gave when his other hand reached down to play with her clit again. The tan man pulled awa to say something but was interupted by the sound of his handorb ringing in his shorts.

"Are...are you gonna...answer that?" Cally asked between breaths. Ink shook his head.

"Fuck it, let it ring." He went to kiss her again when his voice mail kicked on and the dark haired leader's voice came through the gem.

"_Hey Ink, it's loc. you're probably in the bathroom or something...I dunno, anyway I got big news about what happened. I talked to Aberaii and she said she'd be fine for the night, so im on my way home. See you in a minute bro._" *click* The orb gave its robotic 'End Of Message' message and shut off.

"FUCK! GOD DAMN MOTHER FUCKER!" Ink yelled at nothing. "I gotta clean this up. Go...uhhhhh...go get in the shower! Yeah..."He went off rambling. She zipped up her hoodie, and went to leave. On her way out Ink called to her.

"Hey...tomorrow, if you're not doing anything...wanna go to the duel arena?" He scratched the back of his head. It was located in the northern desert in Al-kharid, but it was the only place he could think of at the moment so she didn't walk out feeling used or anything...

"Are you asking me on a date, animal man?" She asked with a smile.

"Depends, are you saying yes?" He asked back, giving his own trademark smile. She walked back over to him and kissed him one last time.

"Tomorrow then, assuming we can get away." With that she was gone and ink got to work cleaning the mess they made.

Yeah, so...that was actually a little fun to write. I might have to sneak a few more of these into some other chapters. Also, we're about to hit a small peroid of down time, but as promised the action will always come back full force, and this time its only a teeny weeny bit of down time. PROMISE!


	10. Again With The Desert

Well, the small down time is over! prepare for a good 2-3 chappies that lead to some major shit! Are you ready my friends? good, read on.

Chapter 10: Again With The Desert

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Cally awoke the next morning feeling great. Okay...She was a little sore, but other than that she felt great. For some odd reason locrusilas had come home later than the pair had expected, and when midnight rolled around and the dark leader still didn't show up, Ink had bursted back into his room and ravaged the archer on the spot.

The blonde creaked her eyes open, immeadiatly noticing that a small ball of white fluff had replaced the summoner who she fell asleep next to last night. She scratched the small dog behind the ear and blue eyes met blue eyes.

"Where'd kin go kane?" She asked and the dog got up, stretched, and jumped off the bed as if to say 'Follow me, i'll show you'. When she still sat watching the dog, he yapped until she got up. She slipped on Ink's hoodie from last night and zipped it up. Cally got up after the small pit bull puppy and it led her out the door.

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When the dog led them to the office of the house/base, she knocked twice and entered. The girl was met with the sight of what appeared a polar opposite mirror, provided you changed the faces.

Kin, or Ink, and Locrusilas were sitting at the desk on opposite sides, both shirtless in pajama pants; Ink's were a light blue color and locrusilas' a dark red. Both were drinking coffee out of white and black cups, respectively. Next to Locrusilas was Aberaii, wearing one of the snow haired man's black button-up shirts. How she was out of the hospital so soon, Cally wasn't sure.

The archer walked over and sat down next to Ink. Kane had trotted over and jumped up in her lap when she sat down. He stretched, laid down, and before anyone even said anything was snoring on the blonde's legs.

"Good morning everyone." Cally said after she yawned. Everyone answered back in their own way.

"Good morning Cally. I trust you slept well." The bi-specaled leader said and threw something her way. She caught it and looked at the object in question, eyes going wide as she realized what Loc had just returned to her.

It was her red scrunchie. She fought the urge to blush and quickly put her hair in a pony tail again, nodding that she slept good and looking off; becoming very interested in the books on the office shelf.

"Anyway, I'm gonna cut straight to the point." The dark skinned man said and took a sip of coffee before continuing. "The chief isn't dead...I don't know why, but he popped in our window last night at the hospital. He healed Aberaii with some kind of tool i've never seen before. Then he handed me this-" Locrusilas tossed fat bag of money on the table."-and this-" At this he held up a slip of paper. The writing on the front looked rushed and shaky, but was clearly an address.

"He told me to meet him here two days from now." The leader said and he put the slip of paper on the table.

"So the guild is back in order? Nobody's losing their jobs?" The archer of the group asked. This time the brunette was the one to respond.

"No, the leader said he was disbanding the guild permanantly. Everone lost their status as a guild operative of the H.S" Cally frowned. She was cancelled before she even started working. Wait...no one else in the room looked worried. Whe looked at each of the other three.

"Relax..." The druid spoke now. He had been smoking for a while now, appearant from the ash that had yet to fall of the cigarette. "You may not be part of the H.S. guild anymore, but all of us are now full time west burthurope guild members." He finished and took a drag of his cancer stick. "Lemme repeat that...ALL of us are W.B operatives." She finally caught the message and squeeled. Everyone laughed and the dark man began speaking again.

"Ok...for the next thirty six hours we're officially on break." Locrusilas said with a smile and Cally got up, claiming she was going to make some breakfast. When Ink still remained in the room Loc attempted to wave him off.

"Go do what you want. Have fun-" Ink cut him off before he could get any further.

"Aaaaactaully, my snow haired friend, we were thinking of maybe going to the duel arena...do a little team fighting...did you wanna come?" Ink asked after a moment.

"That all depends on my teammate...aberaii?" Loc looked over at his fiance.

"Well, the chief said I should be in good condition...I mean...I'm up and moving, aren't I? She answered back and the leader nodded.

"Alright then _kin_, I guess we'll see you soon." Locrusilas smiled and Ink flashed him a grin.

"Don't be mad if I have to wind up whuppin' your sorry ass." Ink flaunted and Locrusilas made to throw a book at him. The druid walked out and the dark man turned to Abaraii.

"Sometimes I really hate that fucker" Fe said, full grin on his face.

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Cally was currently in the rec room watching some form of show on what kind of wood worked better with what metal for crossbows. She was about to demolish the pancakes she made earlier, and was fully clothed in her traditional red tank top and red pants. The was about to take a bite when Ink soared over the back of the couch, dressed in his white hoodie black short combo.

"Hey." She said and she made a waving motion with one hand while the other hand stuffed her face with pancakes. He laughed and changed the channel to a report on some new breed of bug. The blonde finally swallowed and spoke up

"So are we still going to the duel arena?" Cally asked and the bunny man nodded.

"Yeah, in fact Locrusilas and Aberaii are coming with us." He smiled but Cally was a little dissapointed...but she'd have to mess with ink's head a little bit.

"Aww...I thought it was gonna be just us." She said a little put down.

"Don't worry, once we take home the gold we'll go out for drinks, just you and me." He grabbed the blonde's hand and she smiled, but quickly changed her face to a faux-frown.

"Fine...but in return you gotta do me a favor." Cally crossed her arms and nodded her head triuphantly, a smirk plastering itself on her face.

"And that would be?" the druid asked scooting himself closer to the girl.

"...Take off your hat." She commanded and ink dropped his head in dissapointment, thinking she wanted something else. When the blonde snapped her fingers, the tan man walked over to the door, peeked out, locked it, and returned to the sofa; hat off and ears standing up.

"I love your ears..." Cally said and started scatching his ears with her fingerips. He took a deep breath and began making purring noises. The girl bit the tips of his ears again and the purring sound was now a steady rumble. "...They're so sooooooft..." She licked the edge and the bunny druid visible shuddered. His eyes were closed and his hand was clenching. Cally muttered one last thing into his ear before getting up and leaving the room, talking about having her fill or something like that. The animal man couldn't quite connect words together well at the moment, but he remembered a laugh and was left on the sofa.

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It was noon and by the time everyone got ready to leave and in Al-kharid, the duel tornament sign-ups were almost over, and Ink and Locrusilas had to run to reserve a spot for the four of them. The fights were a two-on-two match style, and everyone in the sector had to sign the liability waver. As they looked around, they noticed that the tournament was fairly small. There was only eight other teams in the room, making ten teams total.

Before long, the first match was called. An orange haired man with a green spear and equally green chainmail walked into the arena, followed by a bald man in brown robes. They were greeted by another man and a woman; the man had long brown hair and carried a giant stone hammer. He was shirtless, but had a bear skin kilt on. The woman with the shoulder length black hair had a row of darts in her fingers, and was dressed in snake skin armor.

The fight began, and the orange haired man rushed the barbarian looking man, but had to jump back when the raven haired woman began throwing a barrage of darts at him. The bald man began shooting the darts out of the air with water missles, and caused an earthquake with an earth wave spell to disorientate the dart throwing woman. While that was going on, the barbarian and the spear man were going toe to toe. The barbarian would swing the massive hammer, and the nimble man would dodge and let a flurry of stabbing motions at the brute. the barbaric man sidestepped them all and grabbed the spear. The bald man noticed his teammate's trouble and took aim at the kilted man. He let out a fire blast at the woman before slicing away at the barbaric man with air waves. The magic was just bouncing off the barbarian, and before long he grabbed the orange haired man by the throat and was yelling at the pair to concede. They did, but neither pair could continue. The fire blast meant to stall the woman had hit head on and she had third degree burns on her left arm, and the two warrior men had tapped. Both were sent home with one hundred coins to compensate and for a good match, but the crowd was upset with the short match.

Soon the next match started, and the first team to walk in the arena was a bald dwarf with what appeared to be bombs of all sizes where ever he could fit them, and a female gnome with the traditional green gnome tunic and a bow and arrow for a weapon with rope in a contraption on her side. The other team was made up of two twins; one male and one female. Both had blonde hair, blue eyes, and wore a full steel armor suit, and were equiped with a steel sword and kite shield. Loc commented from fighter's pit that he could easily wipe the floor with the dwarf and took a sip of the bottled water all fighters were given for free, but it was soon hanging to the wall from an arrow that the tiny green woman shot. The dark man was about to say something to the green thing, but Aberaii pulled him back to watch the fight which had just begun.

With practiced ease the dwarf lit a bomb with some tinder located on his forearm and chucked it. The crowd went silent as the explosion gave the female gnome time to tie three small bombs the gnome had given her to her arrow by placing the feathered end of an arrow down in the contraption on her side. She knocked them back and after the dwarf had lit them she let them fly at the male twin; who was still recovering from the blast. The female twin rushed over to where her brother was down and they both put up their shields. A light barrier had activated, and the arrows pinged off of the shield exploding shortly after. The twins dropped the shield and began zigzaging towards the small duo, crossing back and forth in each others path. Willing his legs to move a little bit faster, the blonde boy ran ahead and delivered a low horizontal swipe with his sword, to which the small team jumped to avoid. The blonde girl came running, and vaulted off her brother's back. She built momentum as she launched towards the airborne team, and when she was close enough began spinning. Her blade glowed a golden yellow and she prepared to connect. The dwarf pulled a cord on a device strapped to his forearm and a large circular shield expanded to block the incoming blows. The boy on the ground had been charging his blade, which was now glowing the same gold his sister's sword had been glowing a moment ago. He propelled himself upwards to meet with the defending team, but mid jump he was met with a flash bomb that went off in his face. The dwarf drop kicked him in the head upon landing, and he caught his partner who he swung in an arc only to let her go and give her a little extra power to a flying kick that she delivered the blonde warrior girl's stomach, where almost all plate armor was weak and dentable. She back flipped to land and the judges called the match on a double knock-out. Everyone roared at the way the two teams fought as if they were one.

The next battle was between Ink and Cally, and a team who was currently late. The pair stood in the ring waiting for a good five minutes before the judges we're about to forfiet the other team, when a twister of pink flower petals revealed a woman with pink hair in one of the black outfits from a place Ink had read about once in a book. Something about shin-o-bee and sam-oo-ray's or something like that. The man with black hair was no better in terms of clothing, and was wearing a foriegn robe with a thin sword on his lower back. The woman took out a knife that had a hole in the handle and took a stance, whereas the man simple fell back into his own stance, hand resting above his sword ready to pull it out on a moment's notice. Ink and Cally drew their own weapons, and the blonde readied an arrow while Ink summoned a large praying mantis after drawing his red dagger. The match began and in a heartbeat both foreign fighters were gone and had reappeared in front of the opposing team. The pink haired woman swung her knife down, and Cally dodged to the side and fired an arrow point blank. It missed by a hair and flew into the arena wall, the brick shattering away from the shot. The man's swung on Ink, who blocked with his dagger while his mantis went on the offensive, only to be joined by Ink a second later. The foreign man's blade was moving swiftly, and even after blocking the mantis' and Ink's attacks had managed to get in a few of his own. the druid noted that whenever the man blocked his hit, a jolt of electricity would shoot through his arm. After the mantis swung in with both arms, Ink snuck in a kick to the man's chest.

Cally saw the man flying and took aim. She let her arrow go but the pink haired woman deflected it with her knife and threw her weapon at the blonde. the blonde archer dropped her bow and sidestepped. She caught the knife by the handle and tossed it back at the woman. The pink haired foriegner dodge and made her hand glow blue for a moment; afterwhich she slammed her fist into the ground, causing a slab of earth to fling upwards in the knife's path. A loud 'Get the fuck outta here!' Was heard in the crowd as the battle stopped fpr a small moment in awe of the power the small girl had. The battle continued when the strong girl ran towards Cally with another knife and swung, but the archer backflipped and grabbed her bow. By the time she was upright she had another shot lined up and let go. This time the dark haired man dashed over and cut the arrow before it connected with his partner, then he ran forward and grabbed Cally's chin, forcing her to look into his blood red eyes. When he let go of her, her legs gave out and she slumped to the ground. Ink sent his mantis on the offensive again, and ran over to his partner. He shook her at first, but when she didn't get up he bonked her on the head. That seemed to do the trick though, and soon both were back up. The pink woman snuck up behind Ink and tried to get him to yeild by placing a knife to his throat, but his mantis had dashed over before the pink haired woman could react and used it's 'elbow' to strike her in the face while Ink grabbed her knife and tore it away from his neck. Cally had been to worried about Ink's situation, and the man dashed forward for another attempt at hypnotizing her. The bood red man stopped mid-attack however, when Ink called over demanding that he surrender. His mantis had the girl's hands tied in a sticky web and her neck in the mantis' arm. It's claws were digging deep enough to draw blood and show he meant business.

The foreign team forfieted and the archer/druid team walked back into the fighters pit, celebrating the small win over a bottle of much needed water. The mysterous team simply teleported away, dissapointed with the outcome of the fight and Ink glanced over at his leader, who had told him that the sign up papers said something about kono-something or other. The pair shrugged and kicked back to watch the upcoming fight.

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author note: tell me...who did ink and cally fight against? first person to tell me their names and where they came from gets a kirby

( -.-;)


	11. Earevelations

chapter 11: Earevelations

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The tournament in Al-kharid was moving smoothly. The first fight was a little dull, but the pace quickened up and at one point foriegners had entered the ring. The audience was on the fritz waiting for the next match, which was about to begin.

The two teams walked out and the sized each other up. The first team was made up of two bald men with brown 'mustache-goatees' on their faces. Both had on plain yellow shirts and green pants and had no weapons at the ready...or even equipped for that matter. The opposing team; consisting of woman who seemed to be made of plants as her skin was green, had vines and leaves hanging in some spots, and her hair a darker shade of the same color, and a stone man with what seemed to be lava flowing through his veins looked back at the judges who merely waved for the battle to begin. The rock man wasted no time in running up and attempting to make his fist connect with one of the identical men's chin. The attack connected, and the golem was shocked as the two bald men looked at him as if to ask 'What the hell was that?'

The stone man jumped back to his partner and the two began to charge up for another attack while the two men stood, choosing to watch rather than move. After a second or two of charging, the plant woman released a flurry of leaves in to the air, all of which floated around the pair before the lava man snapped a finger and the leaves burst into flames and flung themselves at the identical team. The attack connected, and the crowd went nuts. Everyone shut up, however, when they saw that the men were still standing. They were cut in someplaces and scorched in others, but other than that were completely intact. The plant woman and stone man exchanged shocked glances. When they heard the crowd go nuts again and the pair looked back to where the bald men were, but they were gone and in their faces in an instant. Both identical men had both delived right hooks to the opposing team and sent them flying. the nature team rolled up on their feet when they hit the ground and dashed off towards the bald men again. The ent woman had materialised a vine like whip while the golem preferred to rush back in bare knuckled.

The duo got about half way before the bald men began charging them as well and soon the teams were matched in a fast paced close combat fight. The ent woman swung with her whip, to which the bald man she was facing side stepped and attempted for a roundhouse kick. she blocked with her own kick, and the bearded stranger attempted another. The process repeated multiple times, combatants occasionally leaning in for a punch or whip slash. While that was going on, the golem had been pounding away at his enemy. Left, Right, Left, Right...Everytime he swung on the smaller man his fist would meet with the other man's fist. You could see the air around each punch collapse in on itself with each blow the fighters threw. The golem switched up on the bald man, and threw a palm strike instead of a punch. When the identical man gave another punch in an attempt to block the big rock's blow, the golem grabbed the smalled man's fist and flung him over his shoulder. Mid-swing, however, the plain man grabbed the giant's fist and instead of flying away like he should have, he planted his feet on the ground and used the momentum the golem had built up to bring him over his shoulder and slam him on the ground. The plain man brought his foot up to stomp the big rock's head in, and a vine wrapped around his neck and pulled him to the ground. The plant woman had taken a brutal axe kick to the head for looking away from her opponent, but the big man capitalized on her help and rolled onto the bald man. He began pounding away at the man's face and after about three or four of the heavy punches the man's face was sunken in, but instead of the blood and bone that should have covered the ground, his head was nothing but a bunch of springs and gears. With a grunt, the lava was off to fight the final bot with his partner. Now that the fight was two on one, things were relatively easy. The golem covered for the plant woman while she focused a spell and shortly the fake man was covered and restrained with vines that had shot out of the ground. The lava man rushed the bot and with let out a flurry of lightning fast punches, afterwhich the vines fell away with the clockwork man's body and the judges announced the victors to be the nature team. The crowd cheered as the victors walked off the stages.

Mid-fight, Locrusilas noted the fact that bots were participating in the duel arena. He tucked the mental file away for later use and sat back in his chair. He didn't have long to rest however, as the judges called for 'Locrusilas and Aberaii". He sighed, grabbed his weapon, and walked out the door into the arena with his partner. They found their opponents already in the ring.

An orange haired man in black robes and odd puffy pants stood waiting. He wielded a huge dark sword, almost the same size as locrusilas', but his looked more like a over-sized chef's knife. His partner was no better, appearing in an odd purple flower print dress. She was a...smaller individual, and her short dark hair matched her purple eyes well. Locrusilas drew his weapon as the bandages came off of the orange haired man's sword. Both his short partner and Aberaii took a firing position, arms out and hands bent upwards as if stopping someone.

The battle began and the two girls immeadiatly fired blasts at each other, the resulting smoke making a cover for the two warriors to engage a heated swordfight. Heavy blows were traded back and forth, and the smoke eventually cleared letting the audience see the fight. swords clanged off each other, the momentum used to swiftly serve a parry to one another. The orange haired man swung down hard, and Locrusilas blocked the blow, but the weight of the sword crumpled him. The black robed man went to swing again but was blasted back by a piercing water missile, followed up with a fire blast after Loc got up and jumped back. The fire blast was shot mid-air with a blast of white lightning fired off from the small girl that accompanied the orange man, and she shot off another blast at the brunette mage. Aberaii slid out of the lightning's path and was met by the same girl who shot at her, now aiming a final blast at her. She was body checked by Locrusilas while Aberaii scrambled to her feet and launched an earth blast at the quickly approaching swordsman. She commanded the attack to detonat mid air when he jumped it, and the resulting blast knocked him back. The snow haired man and his teammate set up a defense, allowing Aberaii to begin chanting. Loc stood in front of her, firing simple air missles to keep the other team occupied.

The pair proved to be too quick for the dark skinned man however, and soon the orange haired man was running back up to try for another strike. He got within striking distance when Aberaii finished chanting and immeadiatly the air around her and locrusilas turned cold, causing anything she commanded to freeze on spot. The swordsman and his partner wern't completely frozen, but they were slowed, and that was good enough. Locrusilas dashed forward and stuck his foot in the orange haired man's chest, successfully knocking him back, while Aberaii aimed at the woman who, being farther away from the spell, gave her more resistance against it. She was able to raise her hand in time to cast some sort of binding spell on Aberaii before she could blast her, and the brunette's arms were locked to her sides as if someone tied her with a rope and she lost balance. When she looked up from the ground, she saw that Locrusilas seemed to be having a problem, as the orange haired man slashed, the woman would fire a blast of lightning at loc. He had to block or dodge another strike, only to definatly having to dodge another attack. Aberaii was trying to get up, but the binding spell was too much and she watched as Locrusilas readied himself for a lightning blast speeding in his direction.

He began mumbling a chant and set his sword in a blocking position. The lightning struck and hit his sword, which shocked him to the point of falling over. However, the same lightning reflected off of his sword and back at the woman. It hit and the binding spell on Aberaii was released. Both women got back up and began rapid firing at each other, each using fire balls as projectiles. In the middle of said projectiles were Locrusilas and the orange haired man, both of whom were moving fast enough to dodge the fire balls and still swing on each other. They locked swords and as the projectiles still came, began dodging. their swords never left each other as the pair jumped, spun, and ducked their way around numerous fireballs, which were now increasing in speed, as if it were a practiced routine. The fire balls stopped and at that moment both fighters pulled their swords back and swung. The force of the collision sent each member back and they used the force of the hit to propel themselves back to their partner.

The orange haired man pointed his sword forward at Locrusilas and Aberaii, and the dark skinned man did almost the same thing, although instead of pointing it directly at one or the other, he aimed in the middle. The raven haired woman grabbed her teammate's sword while Aberaii pointed her now green glowing hands at her partners sword. Both weapons began glowing; the orange haired man's a holy white and Locrusilas' a red hue with tints of green through out it. The energy of both swords focused and shortly later was fired. A blood red blast met a pure white blast in the middle of the arena and the crowd was going nuts over what they were witnessing. The blasts intensified and were now mixing. Locrusilas gripped his blade, focusing even more energy into it. Appearantly, so was his opponent as the blast was getting so big neither opponent could see each other. The energy fulled mixed into a pink and exploded, the force of the blast left a huge crater in the arena and dust flew everywhere. when the air finally cleared, both battlers were sword locked in the middle of the arena, but were so tired that it looked like they were using each other for support instead of fighting. A beeping was heard and the small girl on the orange haired man's team answered some kind of thin, glowing, brick device. She yelled to her partner in a foriegn language and in a flash both were gone.

Locrusilas looked around confused before they announced the winners as himself and Aberaii. They shrugged, limped back into the fighters pit and slumped in the seats they were offered. Everyone was commenting on how well of a fight they put up and handed them bottles of water and unknown potions. Both tired fighters accepted the water, but had to turn down the potions people offered. The judges announced that the last match was the last for a moment, and they would allow the fighters a thirty minute recess before round two began.

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Currently the squad was in the middle of the fighters recess. Locrusilas had pulled Ink aside to talk about something, so that left Cally and Aberaii sitting on the bench, waiting for something to happen. the other fighters had left to do god knows what during the recess leaving the sector in the slightly oversized fighter's pit. The blonde looked over to her current companion.

"So what do you make of this whole guild mess?" Cally asked. She had caught her brunette teammate in the middle of a gulp of water and looked rushed to swallow it to answer.

*pfft* "Hell if i know." The mage said. "All I can say for sure is that i'm definatly gonna follow Locrusilas. If he really wants to go through with the guild again, i'll keep supporting him like I always do." She ended. Through out her entire little 'speech' she stole glances at the currently bi-specaled man.

"Oh yeah, you guys are engaged, aren't you?" Cally asked, but it sounded like she was informing Aberaii of something she already knew. The sand colored mage smiled one of those 'I know something smiles' and removed the archer from whatever she dazed off about.

"Sooo...whats up with you and Ink over there?" she asked and pointed."I figured something was up when you came into loc's office the other day wearing his hoodie." Cally blushed a tiny bit, and other woman instantly knew something had to have happened.

"Yeah...I suppose so..." Aberaii said, nodding her head in approval. "He DOES have a nice body." Cally really didn't know what else to do but nod. Ink sneazed in the distance and Loc clapped the man on the back laughing. The two men took off for a place unknown, leaving the women to talk freely about the men they were involved with. Cally didn't know if Ink minded other's knowing about his bunny ears, but for the sake of conversation decided to risk it.

"Hey, so get this...We have a bunny druid amongst our ranks." The blond said, resisting the urge to snicker. When her brunette 'sidekick' cocked her head at the statement, Cally cleared her throat.

"Y'know Ink?" She asked. Aberaii sent her a look that said 'You dumb bitch, I wasn't born yesterday.' and nodded. Cally brought her hands up to her head with only her first fingers extended and made the same twitching motions a rabbit makes with its ears. Aberaii's eyes wided in surprise and her jaw dropped.

"No way" She said in disbelief.

"Way." The archer responded.

"Can you show me them?" The brunette asked hesitantly

"I can try...." Cally trailed off.

A squee echoed off the arena walls and was followed by laughter. The 'fellas' had returned shorty after with two cheese pizzas, and walked over to sat in the chairs next to the women. Cally took ink's arm before he had a chance to grab a slice and pulled him away from their comrades. When they were far enough away she peeked around Ink to find Locrusilas and Aberaii looking at them as if they'd just stripped in public. Cally made the ear motions to the brunette, leaving an even more confused snow haired man and a sand colored woman looking as if she were about to burst with excitement. Ink was ready to go back and eat however, and attempted such before he was re-caught by the blonde woman.

"Has Loc or Aberaii even seen your bunny ears." She asked as casually as a child would be in asking to go play.

"No...and i'd rather they didn't" Ink said, crossing his arms and feigning anger. He had a feeling he'd be losing this battle, but kept up the facade.

"C'mooooooon...pleeeeeeeaaaaaasssseeee?" She whined, sending puppy eyes to Ink. He felt the playful waves rolling in her aura and heighted his empath senses to allow the waves of emotion to wash over him. Emotions were truly a high meant for him, and him alone. People in the guild would occasionally comment on the way he'd follow particularly happy members around...almost the same way spirit would follow a depressed person. He tilted her chin up and pecked her on the lips before heading back off to the pair they'd abandoned in favor of their world.

She followed him back and the two plopped back into their seats. Ink leaned his head over to the mage and she looked at Cally, who nodded 'permission' to look at the ears. Locrusilas had no idea what was going on, but watched on anyway enjoying the company he had accumulated over his years.

Soon His jaw, along with his fiance's, dropped when the hat came off and two long brown ears stretched themselves up. The druid ALWAYS wore his hat around everyone as far as the dark man knew, and for him to willingly taken it off...Well, lets just day this was literally THE FIRST time the bi-specaled leader had seen the man without something over his head. He laughed as both women had 'attached' themselves to an ear, scratching some spots and rubbing others...was Ink purring? No...Loc had to have been hearing things...

Soon the women had their fill of the ears, or rather, Ink had fallen asleep and they retreated to their seats. Locrusilas knocked Ink on the back of his head, waking the smaller man. He pulled his hat on and after he was actually awake, the leader opened the pizza.

"Everyone did a good job so far, so i figured we'd have a small celebration before the next round. However, I must stress the importance of the fact that even though we are here fighting, we still have things to do so don't get hurt too bad..." he raised a slice of pizza and everyone followed suit. "Other than that, lets eat this stuff before it gets cold." Locrusilas finished; everybody agreed and soon the cheezy delicacy was gone

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Thanks for making it past the chapter 10 mark. hope you all continue to excuse my absense and R&R. btw: more kirbys to the person who tell's me who Locrusilas and Cally fought. I had to try this, and if you guys think this 'switching universes' thing works, i'll try to implement more of it into future fights/scenes.


	12. Showoff

A/N: I apologize for the small chapter, but i want to devote a WHOLE chapter to the fight between the two teams. it'll probably be the best non-lethal fight scene; non-lethal being nobody attempting to kill someone. however there will be blood! always gotta have pain. anyways, enjoy the small chapter and expect the next to follow VERY soon.

Chapter 12: Show-off

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Before long, the squad had devoured the most pizza they could fit without feeling stuffed and got themselves ready for the second bout in the arena. Before long the other fighters filed into the small room and the audience was back in the stands.

The judges announced it was time for part two to begin and this time a referee was in the middle of the arena, and was currently announcing the warriors. When Ink splat and Cally Beur were called, the pair stepped out and the crowd began cheering. The same happened when the gnome and dwarf were called. Ink noticed that the dwarf was looking at him, and flashed the small man a cocky grin. The 'referee' left the arena and the judges announced that the fight was about to begin. The druid called for a time out before the fight even began, and motioned his blonde over to him. He whispered something in her ear and she nodded her understanding. Ink pulled out a pyre lord pouch and slammed it on the ground; a human sized demon composed entirely of flame with looks comparible to the bunny druid who summoned him took form and the real Ink gave a thumbs up. Finally the judges rung a bell signaling the begining of the fight.

The dwarf repeated his actions from his last fight, lighting a bomb and throwing it. The archer/druid team ran to opposite sides of the arena, and Ink ran at the short pair barehanded, but before he could even get close enough to attack the gnome had shot three arrows his way. The summoner ducked them, but the projectiles exploded mid-air behind him and sent him flying foward towards the small team. Close enough that the dwarf tried to raise his oddly large foot and stomp on ink's head, but the druid rolled to the side and pushed himself up to his feet. Instantly another group of arrows were closing in on him and he ducked to the side and took off running. A bomb was chucked in his path, and with reactions he didn't even know he had, picked it up and threw it back. It was just a flash bomb however and both the drawf and the gnome had flipped down goggles of some sort that made the flash seem like a candle light to them.

Ink took the time before the flash to glance over to his partner who was currently working on part 'A' of the plan he had told her, and it seemed to be working fine. He would distract the two midgets while Cally heated up the tips of her arrows to red hot points with the pyre lord Ink summoned earlier and fired the flaming hot arrows at the contraption on the gnome's side. Currently there were four arrows sticking out, completely unnoticed. About two more arrows should catch the next bomb she put in there and then...well...boom.

The short pair wern't about to lose that easily though, and before the animal man could recover from the flash, the gnome landed a solid flying kick to Ink's chest, knocking him back and on the ground. As the dwarf ran up attempting for a hit while ink was getting up, the druid's eyes flashed red for a moment and a fire ball was fired from the flame familar. It missed the small man, but it was enough to get him to retreat away from him.

'Shlink'

The sound of metal on metal was sounded. the arrow cally had shot wasn't hot enough, and it only dented in the tough metal contraption instead of melting its way through. The short gnome immeadiatly took notice of the protrusions from her machine and in no time had her bow trained on Cally. Ink's plan of exploding the item was tossed out the window, but at least the small green woman had stopped shooting bombs.

The bunny druid focused his familar on the dwarf to distract him while he rushed the gnome, who was curently still shooting at Cally. Ink grabbed the small woman by the back of her outfit and lifted her off of the ground. The dwarf saw what was happening and attempted to rush over to help his comrade, but Ink's familar stood in the way of that and booted the small man in his chest; which now had a foot sized burn mark. Ink mentally slapped himself for not thinking of doing this when the match first began, and with his free hand, grabbed her bow from the gnome woman's hand and chucked it. The arrows were the next thing to go, and before long the woman was completely weaponless. The druid pushed a pressure spot behind her long, oddly shaped ear and she was knocked out. He set her down and began his walk over to the dwarf, who was being spooked by the fire familar with one of his own bombs that had fallen out of his rucksack. The pyre lord would bring his finger close to the fuse and pull it away, just to repeat the process. Ink walked over and picked up the bomb, looking back at Cally with a grin.

She seemed to know what he was thinking and knocked back an arrow. The tan man walked to the center of the arena and launched the bomb up, making it easily climb to about ninety feet, calling his familar over immeadiately after he tossed the bomb up. His partner followed the bomb up with her arrow and shot when it peaked. An explosion rang out from the arrow piercing the bomb, and ink used his familar to control the blast; eyes turning red again and both his and the pyrelord's arm's raised up. They manipulated the blast to spell out "victory" and the crowd went wild. The three combatants, pyre lord included, took a fool-hearted bow, and turned to walk off of the arena when the blonde archer flew foward, the dwarf landing in her spot.

Cally was laid on the ground, dizzy from a kick the small man jumped to perform. A knot was forming on her head from where the dwarf kicked her, and ink turned on the midget.

"You little SHIT!" The tan man roared at the dwarf, who assumed another fighing position. He must have figured he could take the larger man, since he hadn't run off yet. He thought ink was fighting hard before...but no. Now Ink actually had a reason for performing bodily harm on the small man and his animalistic nature took over. He commanded his pyre lord to grab onto the small man, burns taking place as soon the summon touched the man. The crowd gasped as the tall man kicked the shorter man in the gut, then in the face; knicking the dwarf out of the fire creatures grip. Normally people would berate the druid for beating on a smaller person, but dwarves were known for their amazing strength and this particular one had asked for the beating.

"Apologize! On your knees and apologize!" Ink yelled at the smaller man, who groaned in pain but complied right away. The tan man dismissed the familar, after which he charged the little man and made his foot connect with the already beaten dwarf. The druid walked away and medics were sent in the arena to collect the two small people as Ink helped Cally up and they left the arena. Upon re-entering the fighters pit, Cally was handed a cold pack frozen with magic and the two sat down. Locrusilas called Ink a show off and the bunny man flipped the bird at his leader, then went off to find of medication for his partner's headache. The arena was cleaned up before the rabbit eared man could get back however, and the judges were ready to begin the next match.

As if on cue, both teams walked into the arena on cue. Docrusilas definatly knew that he and his partner could easily take on the opposing team, of which was the golem and the plant lady this time around, but figured he'd draw the fight out a little bit. After all, a water spell to the lava man would probably sizzle him out...and the plant woman would most likely wither away from the heat of a fire spell.

'O_n second thought_-' Loc said to himself. 'Our last opponents DID leave early on us.' He caught Aberaii's attention and jerked his head towards the opposing team, giving a thumbs down while doing so. The brunette immeadiatly caught on to what he was communicating and nodded. The referee signaled the begining of the match and the fight began. Both the golem and the ent-woman ran at the the two operatives, who were both holding out a hand. The golem increased his speed, getting closer so he could land a hit on the snow haired man, but was stopped when Locrusilas fired a water blast at the golem. The liquid attack caused the rock man to double over in pain, veins of lava already hardening from the cool water spell. The green woman saw what happened to her comrade but continued her rush at the pair of mages, pulling her whip back to snap at the pair. Before she could bring her arm down for the attack however, Aberaii had already launched her fire wave; the immense heat causing the plant-like woman to visibly shrink as she dropped to the ground. The crowd went wild at the speedy victory and again the team of medics were sent out, a special stretcher for the golem. Locrusilas and Aberaii walked off the arena floor and the second bout was over. As soon as the medics were gone the judges called for a second recess, this one lasting fifteen minutes instead of thirty.

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As soon as Locrusilas and Aberaii stepped through the door to the fighter's pit, the only team left besides them exclaimed how much of a show off the pair of mages were.

"You really just had to end it like that? Couldn't have given the audience a better show?" The druid asked.

"What can I say, in out last match our opponents left before we were done." Locrusilas replied.

"Oh well, just means that Cally and me get to whup your guys' sorry asses." At this everyone except for his own partner flipped Ink the bird. He shrugged and was about to say more, but Aberaii interuppted him.

"Cally, please hush the bunny." The ex-receptionist asked/told the blonde 'keeper of ears', and the blonde put put both of her hands on top of Ink's head and began scratching the spots where his ears would be under the hat while easing the man back into a chair.

"You done now?" She asked when he was fully seated.

"So long as you keep scratching." He said, eyes glazed over due to the magic fingers of his partner. "So...anyway, we're the last teams left." The bunny man said after a small moment.

"Yeah...don't hold anything back?" Loc said holding out a fist. Ink grinned and pounded his fist against his friend's.

"Oh yeah." he agreed. Almost as if the judges were listening; They called for the final match to begin. Everyone in the room walked to the doors and entered into the arena.

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	13. Fugitives

i know i know im late as hell, and the chapters are rushed as hell, but at least im bringing you two new chapters that advance importantly. aha, see you thought i was just making people fight. oh no...we're leading up to some sick shit, so hold on just a bit longer and continue on to...

chapter 13: Fugitive(s)

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_"so...anyway, were the last teams left." the bunny man said after a small moment._

_"yeah...don't hold anything back?" loc said holding out a fist. ink grinned and pounded his fist against his friend's._

_"oh yeah." he agreed. almost as if the judges were listening; they called for the final match to begin. everyone in the room walked to the doors and entered into the arena. _

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The two teams walked onto the arena floor, creating distance between themselves as they went until they were on opposite sides or each other. the judges called for the match to begin and...

...neither side moved. not much anyway. ink and locrusilas exchanged some signals and then spoke to their teammates. finally, both fighters began walking foward, fist out ready to touch 'gloves' and start the fight. their fists were about to meet when ink made a 'hold-on' motion with his hand. after loc finally stepped back the druid pointed to his hat, practically asking the audience if he should remove his skull cap. the audience, Cally and Aberaii included, let out a loud roar of approval and the tan man yanked off his hat and tossed it to his partner; raising his rabbit ears to full height. the audience hooped and hollered again; causing the bunny man to flatten his ears again, only this time in pain. the crowd quickly caught the message and quited down allowing Ink to hear properly. the combatants walked fowards, touched 'gloves', and fell into a fighting stance as the fight began.

the animal man fell back into a stance; hands up ready to jab while bouncing on his toes. the stance feintly reminded one of an anthromorphic rabbit in a fight, complete with the ears. Loc's style, however, was more in one spot. he was slightly turned to the right, left hand open and out towards Ink while his right fist hung down slightly at the waist, ready to deliver a devastating upper cut. Ink's ear twitched and he was off, clearing the small gap between the men with ease. he attempted a right jab at the dark man's face, but feigned into a upper cut, and that turned into a right hook. all three of the hits were blocked, and the final punch was caught by the snow-haired man. with his free hand, loc pulled back and began attempting to cave in the smaller man's chest. the hits kept falling to the side due to the rabbit man bouncing just barely out of the fist's path, but eventually one found it's way to ink's chest and the tan druid flew back. he flipped to land on his feet and began another dash toward loc.

He got right in front of the dark warrior and darted off to the side to re-appear behind loc's head. the dark man flung face first into the ground from an axe kick delivered to the back of the head; curtosy of ink, but countered by catching himself with his hands to 'mule kick' at ink's chin. the druid, being naturally agile, flipped just out of the kicks reach and retreated a bit, allowing his opponent to finally land on his feet. as soon as locrusilas touched down, the two men took off again at each other. they met in the center of the arena and began raining punches on one another, only to block and retaliate in one swift motion. loc would step to the side to avoid a hit and jab at ink's head, but the smaller man pushed his attack aside and brought one of his own fists up to meet with the dark man. That too would get blocked, and locrusilas leaned back out of the jabs reach and attempted a boot to ink's stomach, but the nimble stepped out of the way and put his leg under the dark skinned man's and lifted up. the white haired man grinned and went along with the flip, bringing his other foot to connect with the side of the tan man's face. that caused ink to back off a little to avoid the attack while locrusilas sprung back to his feet. both men stared each other in the eye before raising their hands and walking back to their partners.

The crowd was not left hanging however, as Cally and Aberaii wasted no time in running up to each other and engaging in their own hand-to-hand 'warm-up'. the men sat back and watched while the girls jabbed and kicked at each other, occasionally catching one another with a feint. loc had to admit, for being long-distance types, their hand to hand skills wern't bad. the girls fell back a small ways and stared each other down, falling back into their stances. Cally seemed to have taken a page out of ink's book as she was lightly bouncing left to right ready to take off any moment, but her hands wern't brought up as high. Aberaii's stance, on the other hand, was very...mystical. she stood with her feel close; one pointing in front while the other was turned off to the side, and her right hand was outstretched, the other resting just below her chest.

The two girls began circling one another, closing in until they were within striking distance. cally let out a flurry of jabs, all aiming for the mage's head, but the brunette blocked or steped out of the way of the blows. The archer snuck her foot behind aberaii's and yanked. the girl fell backwards to the ground, but swept her leg to the side, effectively crashing into the back of Cally's knee; sending her to the ground as well. Both women rolled away from each other and stood up. They nodded and walked away from each other; their new destination being their partner's side.

After a very quick regrouping, both teams met each other in the middle of the arena; about twelve feet seperating the fighters. All eyes were on Cally as she shot an arrow straight up. it dissapeared into the clouds, confusing the crowd as neither team moved yet. Seconds passed and still no movement from any of the fighters.

Finally the sound of metal lodging itself into dirt was heard, and the competitors were off. Ink and Locrusilas had quickly cleared the small gap between them, and the pair engaged in a close combat struggle. Ink's small dagger posed little defense against the dark warrior's two handed sword, but the man was quick enough on his feet to get out of the red blade's path. Cally; who had been aiming at the fire balls Aberaii had been blasting; noticed her partner was having a little trouble.

"Flip!" The blonde yelled to her partner, and without hesitation the druid stepped out of the swords way one more time and flipped backwards. In about a span of half a second the archer lined up a shot at Locrusilas and let go. The arrow passed under Ink while he was in mid-air and cruised straight for locrusilas. The snow haired man was aware of what they were doing, however, and blocked the arrow with his large blade. The plan DID allow Ink to escape though, and he took that opportunity to summon the praying mantis from the earlier match.

Cally had to go back to keeping Aberaii and her magic at bay, while Ink and Locrusilas were engaged in a 'circle of death'. Loc held his sword down, but pointed it up; taking what was close to a samurai's stance with the large sword. Ink, however, looked more nimble. Standing next to his mantis, the two sort of bobbed and weaved like they'd take off any moment. That finally rang true when the druid darted to the right; performing a half circle to meet Loc with a slash while his mantis mimiced the same attack. Loc stepped back out of the path's way and parried by bringing the massive sword down. The attack completly miss Ink, but his mantis had lost an arm. The dark man capitalized on the summon's loss, and followed up with a horizontal slash; slicing the mantis in two. the remnants of the familar burned in a blue flame before dissapearing. Ink wasted no time in readying another summon; this time a smaller green, four-legged, mantis called a void shifter, except this one's head was noticably larger and looked like a shield, so much so that the summon had no noticable eyes.

the two rushed locrusilas, reading a swipe attack. the dark man swiped his sword at the two, but instead of cutting, the druid dissapeared in a purple poof and came back behind the suited man. A kick to the back later, and the white haired man was eating dirt. The dark man rose to his feet and turned to meet ink, who was making a 'bring-it' motion with his hand. the two ran towards each other, and ink did the same teleporting motion he did before, but loc had his own ways to teleport, and soon the two were fighting all over the stage.

while all that was happening, Cally and Aberaii had been involved in their own fight. Cally had activated her hawk eyes, which slowed the speedy little mage down...in her vision anyway. Before the eyes, The brunette mage was too quick to track and hit with an arrow, but now everything was clear. cally raised her bow and shot off three arrows into the earth missle that was quickly approaching her. the giant rock shattered, and cally already and another three arrow knocked and was looking for aberaii. the blonde turned to the left, and was greeted by aberaii dashing towards her; hand glowing a magical white. The archer let go of her arrows, but the mage swatted them away. once inside a close range zone, aberaii attacked with swipes of her hands. one got a little to close to cally's side, and sliced the first layer of her vest. The blonde retaliated with a kick to the smaller woman's mid-section and retreated; knicking back another arrow and instantly letting it fly. Aberaii recovered in enough time to dodge the arrow flying towards her, but oddly enough set herself up for a teleport kick to the back of the head, courtesy of ink. she caught herself before she hit the ground, and flipped to right herself. ink's victory was short lived as well, because before he landed locrusilas teleported next to him, grabbed his leg, and flung him. Aberaii readied a fire blast and threw it toward aberaii's arrow, which incinerated it and continued towards cally. she dived to the side to avoid it, but put herself in another fireball's path. she didn't have enough time to pull herself up and dodge the next projectile crusing towards her, so she readied herself for the blow and waited.

**BLAM!!**

Was the sound she heard, and she felt intense heat, but she didn't feel any pain. She looked up and was 'greeted' by the sight of a scorched ink facing her. The man took the attack to the back and froze up, breathing heavily from the pain. Loc finally teleported near Ink and held him up when the druid fell.

"Ink! Hey buddy, you okay?" the leader asked. He no response, only the sound of Ink panting. Aberaii walked up, hand over her mouth in disbelief.

"Oh my god...I'm so sorry Ink." the druid gave her a weak thumbs-up and then dropped his hand. Cally finally pulled herself to her feet and helped Locrusilas sit the burned man down on the ground and let Aberaii have a good look at him. The mage's breath caught in her throat in surprise , and the dark skinned leader to picked up on the sound.

Locrusilas looked up at her, and then at Ink, finally noticing the blast had completely disingrated the back of his shirt. Then he realized why everone was staring the way they were.

The damn tattoo that marked Ink. Boo's were heard from the crowd, as after some of the slaves escaped from falador they were branded as criminals. over the years thats what everyone who didn't know began to think of the branded people. Aberaii immeadiatly began applying healing magic to the man, enough to the the point where he could stand and talk anyway, but had to stop as five guards surrounded the group. One guard stepped foward and spoke.

"We are to take the fugitive into custody and turn him over to the Falador Guard, where he will be tried and re-sentenced." The guard said in an official manner. "Turn him over or be marked as criminals as well." He finished, causing Ink to look up at the man; a feeling of hate rising from deep in his gut.

"Fuck...you" he breathed, still aching from the burn earlier. Aberaii had no idea what was happening and looked to her companions in confusion. Locrusilas stepped back to talk to her.

"look, i'll explain later, but if you wanna know we have to leave now." he stressed the last word to get her to understand. ink could be heard in the back ground still arguing with the guard. "so? are we going?" locrusilas asked aberaii again and she nodded. "good." he said and walked away to the guards, green glowing hands behind his back.

"I do apologize, Al-khardian soldiers, i really do." he began as he got closer to the guards. "But we just cannot turn this man over to you." he ended and the crowd booed again, followed by the guards drawing their weapons.

"Turn him over or face the consequences!" the head guard yelled. Locrusilas rose his hand and snapped. instantly large thornless vines came out of the ground and surrounded the five guardsmen; binding them to their places.

"Run!" Locrusilas yelled and Cally helped Ink to his feet. He was well enough to run on his own, and the four left the arena as fast as they could.

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The four had successfully fled to the outskirts of Al-kharid without any obstacles. Aberaii had finished healing ink as best as she could and the four discussed what just happened and what to do now.

"They're gonna send forces after us, you know" ink said to locrusilas "we can't stay in one spot for long." he finished and waited for a reply but instead got a question from aberaii.

"wait. before anyone goes any further, what just happened?" the mage asked. she had no clue as to why guards were chasing them. ink was the one who answered her question. He gave her the quick story of what happened, and why the tattoo made people chase him. He was completely calm this time...maybe it was the fact that guards wer about to be hot on their trail.

"So anyway, loc, what do we do now?" she asked again.

"Well, we have to get back to base for one, but we can't go through varrock. By now the Al-khardian government has taken notice of a 'fugitive' of falador traveling with a group, and they probably notified their allied cities...which would be Varrock, Draynor, Lumbridge, and of course Al-kharid. What i'm thinking we should do is attempt to kill two birds with one stone." At this everyone looked at him like he'd just spoken another language, causing him to elaborate. "do you remember ink, when we met with the guild chief? he gave us our pay, and the file about the ghosts north of varrock. since we're gonna have to go around into the wilderness, where the ghosts are, to pass varrock; I suggest we try to find out whats up with the ghosts if we have the time. The guild chief DID say he wanted to talk to us again...tomorrow in fact." he finished and ink agreed with him.

"yeah, the more we get on his good side the better. I say we do it." ink said and everyone else agreed the same.

"Alright then, lets get moving. we got a hard day ahead of us. Also, if we do get spotted by guards and have to fight them, do NOT kill them." locrusilas said and everyone nodded. they turned to walk away from their resting spot but heard a very annoying sound.

"Get them!" an Al-khardian soldier yelled and ink swore

"It figures!" the druid yelled and locrusilas motioned for everyone to run, but the only thing that did was catch more guards attention. now they had six guards chasing them and loc finally changed his mind.

"Ok fuck it, blow them to shit Cally." he commanded and the blonde was happy to oblige. she reached in a side pocket on her bag and pulled out one of the small explosive rodents, or chinchompas, and hurled it at the group of guards. the explosion was heard, but they didn't bother to look back as they crossed the border of Al-kharid and moved into Varrock's outskirts. the walls of the city were visible, but so long as they stayed far enough away they should be mistaken for common travelers. Loc gave ink his suit's jacket to cover up the tattoo and the squad left to do what had to be done.

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About ten minutes into the journey past varrock, Cally pulled Aberaii back to talk to her in whispers; though the subject was something that didn't need to be kept secret.

"Hey, Aberaii...Umm...If it's not too much trouble could you maybe..." the blonde paused for a moment. "...train me in a little bit of magic? i feel like once you started getting serious when we fought there was nothing i could do, and..." The archer trailed off, and Aberaii smiled at the question.

"Of course i'll help you. it's not like you're asking me to perform miracles." the irony of the comment was lost as Cally spoke up again.

"well...i've just never done magic before." she said, looking off somewhere else. Ink and Locrusilas were to busy debating whether to head deep into the wilderness to avoid being spotted to hear any of the girls conversation.

"you've never done magic?...like, ever?" the mage asked and Cally shook her head. "Hm...well...it'll be tough, but im willing if you are." Aberaii said; causing her blonde companion to smile lightly. "it's settled then. As soon as we get back to the base and everyone's settled we'll start going over the basics. don't expect this to be something you can pick up on in a day, or even a week for that matter." the brunette said, ending the conversation.

The next couple of minutes of the trip were filled with nothing but silence and occasional comments. one particular one from Ink almost sparked a convorsation, but it was abrupty cut short when locrusilas spotted the ditch that seperated the wild from the civilized parts of Glienor. It was deep and a little wide, but nothing a good jump couldn't clear. one by one the operatives crossed the ditch, and immeadiatly the group felt the chaotic energy that eaminated from within the wilderness. Locrusilas pulled out his map, reading it and eventually pointing in the way that would take them to the most recent 'ghost' sighting. The group set off once again for unknown destinations, dangers, and surprizes deep within the wilderness.

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	14. Relevant Revenants

See how i brought you two chapters? did you like that? good, i intend to make up for lost time. prepare for trouble as our characters venture forward to...

Chapter 14: Relevant Revenants

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The group had been walking for quite sometime now. They had reached the area north of varrock a while ago, and decided to move even deeper to see if anything could be found.

"Anyone see anything yet?" Locrusilas asked. His sword was drawn, along with everyone else's weapons. the wilderness wasn't a fun place to be, and many times thieves and robbers hid out waiting to kill and rob the next thing that approached them.

"I'm not seeing much other than trees and dark." True to Ink's word, everything around them was shrouded in darkness and shadows. The sun was still out, but for some reason the light couldn't penetrate through the evil aura in the wilderness. Combined with being in a "forest" of dead trees and you would be completely blind, and they would be if Aberaii's magic hadn't illuminated the area in a light green glow. The light extended a good ten or so feet, and then faded into nothing...almost like the dark was eating whatever light had managed to make its way into the dead forest.

Speaking of magic and mages, the resident mage had been having odd twitches ever since the group entered the wilderness. Quick "looks" over her shoulder, jumping occasionally, and at one point growling in frustration after looking around. the group paid no mind to her actions, due to a panicked feeling that was a common side effect of walking around in the wilderness. It wasn't sub-consious, instead the aura in the wild sort of implants itself into your "soul" and makes you actually feel scared of everything, but nothing at the same time. Many years of wilderness travel had Locrusilas tuned to the inhuman area, but Ink and Cally were slightly affected by the evil energy; both of them had their weapons drawn and were ready to attack anything.

Even still, Aberaii was the most affected by the area; but it wasn't the energy that was doing it. The brunette swore she kept seeing a person sneaking around just along the edge of the light she made, but every time she tried to catch a glimpse it darted out of her vision just to return moments later. Anymore of this and she was sure she'd snap!

"God Dammit!" An annoyed mage yelled as the vision darted in front of her this time. "Does anybody else see this!?" She half-asked, bring up another charged hand ready to blast the damn thing into oblivion.

"Aberaii, stop!" Locrusilas hissed and ran towards her in an attempt to stop her seeing as the goal of this "mission" was to stay hidden, and blowing absoloutly nothing up would only serve to cause them trouble. Aberaii looked over to her fiance and leader who should have cleared the small distance to her, but instead the snow haired man slowed to a crawl...in fact everybody and everything was slowing down, almost freezing in time. The glow from Aberaii's hand vanished, but at the same time stayed where it was. The girl herself was free to move around in the "picture" of time, although she chose to remain in one spot. As far as she knew, this wasn't any spell she knew how to cast.

Then she saw it. The same figure from before darted in front of her and hid behind the anxious, knife wielding figure of Ink. Aberaii moved to try and get a better view of the thing, but it moved again and hid itself behind a nearby tree. The mage noticed the shadow like thing was getting closer and closer as it hid behind different things. She readied a blast and fired, but the moment her attack left her hand it froze in time along side everything else. The shadowy creature chose this time to make its move, and lunged at the brunette; knocking her to the ground while staring directly into her eyes. The girl tried to throw the creature off of her, but the damn thing was acting like it was attatched to her. Suddenly her head snapped straight and her eyes were forced open by unknown forces, and while the creature was staring into her very soul, she saw flashed of numerous things.

_'Ancient Gods...'_ At this a vision of four animals were shown at war with one another; these animals being a blue wolf, a silver eagle, a red snake, and an orange bull. Along side these animals were miniature versions of them. they were goring, clawing, biting...anything they could do to harm the other. the vision was brutal and violent, but soon she was greeted by another sight.

_'Ancient Weapon...'_ Now she bore witness to an old men, a demon, an ogre, and an eagle type being each brutally fighting each other for an item that rested in the center of their icy makeshift arena. everytime attack of the warriors were killing blows, and the carnage would splatter everywhere, but the fighters would miraciously heal themselves and rejoin the fight. it seemed as if it could get no worse, but another vision was soon showed.

_'Ancient Power...' _In this vision, she saw the four men from before laying useless on the floor of their arena. they wern't dead, merely exhausted and unable to move. eventaully each of the four beings faded away, and the icy arena where they once fought was closed up and buried deep underground. The vision scrambled for a moment, but quickly changed to the inside of the dungeon again, this time looking much darker. nothing was happening at the moment, but soon a loud rumble was heard and soon a cloaked warrior was seen dashing throught the cavern and away from the giant hoard of monsters. he seemed calm and collected, almost as if he had been chased by monsters on a daily basis. he made for the exit of the cavenrn but was blocked off by two of the larger monsters that had been chasing him. he seemed as if to think for a moment, but soon he unsheathed what he'd been trying to smuggle from the dungeon. A massive silver sword with a decorative hilt and two small blades on the larger blade was brandished, but that didn't stop the advancing monsters. the cloaked man gripped the hilt of the sword tightly, and it began to glow a holy silver; swinging it not shortly after it glowed it brightest. The powerful sword connected with one of the monsters and a large explostion decimated everything in the room...except for the warrior and the sword. the man looked at the weapon one last time and skimpered off.

_'The visions you see here are ancient, past, and present." _A voice hissed in the brunette's ear. _"As a member of the Zaddranian order, you are to act appropiatly to the prophecy..." _The presence dissapeared and time began to pick back up and return to normal.

The little time jump cause Aberaii to appear to have teleported from one spot to another, but she was quickly located by locrusilas, who'd pulled out an old oil lamp to see.

Locrusilas bent down to check on the shaking unconsious mage, and was scared to find her pulse beating faster than it should be.

"We're gonna have to put this ghost thing on hold, guys...we gotta get her checked up...at least a free lance medic." locrusilas said after Ink gave him a look that clearly stated he was a CONVICT and could not be seen by any falador alliances. The druid made to say something but was interupted by the squad's blonde archer.

"Hey, we gotta talk about this later, look!" Cally yelled and pointed to a white figure deep within the darkness. it seemed ti be just sitting there watching. Locrusilas' leader instincts kicked in and he began barking orders.

"Ink, summon a pyrelord for light and take a picture of that thing on the handorb. Cally, get some arrows ready to cover our retreat just incase they try to rush us. I'm gonna pick up Aberaii and then we're gonna make a dash for it, understood?" the dark skinned man asked in a hushed tone and recieved two thumbs up, signaling they clearly knew what to do. Ink's firey familar was summoned once again, providing excellent light for the squad, and the druid reached into his pocket and pulled out the gem, focusing it on the white figures...wait a minute.

"Bad news, folks." Ink said, anxiety begining to set back into his voice. "Our frend down there has company now." as he finished and the rest of the squad looked up, two more white figures appeared next to the original; all three began to advance slowly on the four operatives. Ink quickly snapped the picture and called his pyrelord to his side, ready to attack the white objects. Cally stepped up next to him and knocked back three arrows. The three white figures were now close enought to identify; appearing to be spirit like warriors. They began to pick up speed, not even bothering to move their ghost like legs in favor of levitation. Cally shot off the three arrows and stuck the three warriors in the chest. they stopped for a moment and Ink saw his golden opportunity, running forward and kicking an arrow deeper in one of the ghost like beings and cut another warrior all the way down its side. he jumped back and eyed his opponents again. instead of blood on their wounds, there was only void as if nothing existed beyond the outside.

"Loc! get her the hell outta here!" Kin yelled and the dark leader wasted no time in taking off with Aberaii in his arms. The druid sent the pyrelord forward for an assault of flaming punches, Cally following up by fitting the other ghosts with five arrows each. Ink ran forward to get beside his familar as they double teamed two of the ghosts. they beat them back a considerable distance and moved onto the remaining specter, leaving cally to keep shooting the warriors. Both Ink and the pyrelord sent in a massive burning boot and knocked the ghost clean in half. The druid "air-fived" his familar and they went to go to the next ghost.

They would have gone to the next ghost...if the first one they'd destroyed hadn't turned into two of the ghosts. now they had four ghosts to worry about, and chances are if one did it the others will do it.

"I'm getting sick of this fighting shit..." Ink spat, regretting even choosing to go anywhere today as the four of the ghosts surrounded the pair of operatives.

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Locrusilas bursted out of the dark forest running abd stopped to be greeted by more darkness. this kind wasn't as bad however, as there were no trees to block out what little sun came through the dark aura of the wilderness; which allowed him to see as if the moon was shining brightly at night. After a glance around for familar landmarks, which was really the only way to find your way around as compass' just spun, he noticed a rock that he'd seen before and began dashing towards town. He'd made it a good distance before he spotted the ditch that led to varrock and stopped.

'_The Al-khardian governtment has probably taken notice of a 'fugitive' traveling with a group, and they probably notified their allied cities...'_ the dark man remembered saying a few hours ago, and questioned whether he really should stick to his original idea and her to an emergency hospital or be truthful and actually find a 'freelance medic', which was the lie he made to the gullible druid.

"fuck it..." he muttered and made the walk to the ditch, ready to force whatever doctor to fix whatever was wrong with his fiance. The light was begining to pierce through the darkness, signaling he really was getting closer to the end of the wilderness. About twenty more feet now, and he'd make the jump over the ditch to Varrock.

"Ahoy friend! you look troubled!" a man clad in dark robes came running up to Locrusilas. Had he not been so far away and greeted the leader the way he did, Loc would have already had his blade jammed through the stranger's face.

"yeah, a little bit. my partner and I were looking for something in the wilderness, and then we were attacked." Locrusilas lied. "is there anyplace nearby I could take her to get her injuries treated...something besides the Varrock hospital. We're not exactly liked there." he lied to a point again. Locrusilas knew it sounded shifty and second-handed, but it was the only thing he could think of and besides, he couldn't trust anybody right now.

"Ah, there is my friend! please, hurry this way." the robed man motioned for locrusilas to follow him and the two ran off. After about five more minutes of running they came upon a small shack located just over the ditch of the wilderness. the two men made the jump, and the robed man welcomed locrusilas into his home. "please, set her down on the cot." he said and Locrusilas complied, taking care to set the brunette mage down carefully. The white haired man stood up and was about to turn around to face the strange, but before he could move he had a blue scimtar to his neck, pressing hard enough to draw blood.

"we know who you people are, criminal, now where are your 'friends'? Tell us, or die on the spot." a new voice threatened. This one was different however, it was more femine than the other person's voice. Loc glanced to the left and noticed another robed person, obviously female due to a larger 'chest', and for a moment the snow haired man thought he knew who his captors were. Right now, life was worth anything he could think of, so he spoke.

"Alem?" the dark man spoke through the darkness of the shack and recieved a startled gasp as an answer.

"Locrusilas?" This time the gruff voice spoke again. A cheap oil lantern was used to illuminate the small 'house' and the captives faces became clear.

"Loc!" both of the robed people practically announced. The man holding Locrusilas pulled the blade away from the dark skinned man's throat and tossed the blue scimtar to his partner. Both figures laughed for a small moment before the smaller person pulled back her hood, revealing aqua blue hair and equally blue eyes. Her parnter pulled back his hood and soon onyx black hair was pointing up in all directions and the scars on the man's face stood clearly.

"Desma and Alem! Ha!" Locrusilas laughed. "For a moment, I thought I was gonna die!" The leader exclaimed with a grin plastered on his face, laughing almost immeadiatly after the sentence. Soon the other people in the dimly lit shack joined in the laughter, but it died down as the situation began placing itself back into the mix. Locrusilas explained his situation to his two comrades and without hesitation the two were more than willing to help. Alem walked over to a wall, pulling out three runes with a blue scale on them and placed them in a tray that was sticking slightly out of the wall. The blue haired woman slid the tray into the wall; not long after which a dim glow caused a small box to appear on the floor. The woman opened it up and pulled out a handfull of leaves along with a vial full of water and a pestle and morter.

The two men sat, one watching his partner work about making some kind of potion; while the other man's worry for his team began sinking back into his consience.

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Authors note: the things the team are fighting are known as revenant ghosts (hence the chapter name). i did beef them up a little bit, but their ability to be annoying as hell (as well as dangerous) remained intact. they come in all varieties; anywhere from goblin to dragon, and litterally regenerate themselves. that's very problematic when they deal intense damage...let's hope the heroes of our story survive this obstacle and make it home. God knows Locrusilas needs a beverage.


	15. Back up

yo. still trying to get shit up to speed again, but fret not! all is well and now its just back down to actually progressing the story. action might be over for a teensy bit. on the flip side get ready to see someone totally new...and totally odd...

chapter 15 : back-up

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"On your left!" Cally called out to Kin as a ghostly warrior came swiping with his sword. The druid bobbed backwards and sliced part of the spirits arm, noting that small pieces of the ghosts couldn't regenerate; on the body or otherwise. Running up on the same enemy that had attacked him a moment earlier, Ink delivered a stab to the ghost's chest and shoved him back; retreating to Cally's side after and calling his Pyre Lord to his side.

The attackers were closing in on the pair, who were currently trying to figure out a little bit more on their 'might-be' killers. Cally launched a few more arrows at one, all of which found a home in the ghost being's neck, and the ethreal warrior froze on the spot. Again Ink filed away a note on the ghost, and blocked a sword swing meant for his head. The summoner's familar dashed forward to deliver the blow that Ink couldn't, slamming it's knee into the spirits chest and sending the damn thing flying. Ink looked over just in time to watch Cally reach for an arrow before she looked behind her and realized she'd shot her last piece of ammunition.

"Shit! I'm out!" The archer yelled out and kicked away one of the ghosts that tried to sneak up on her.

"Then we're out! C'mon!" Cally's teammate yelled as the glow of the pyrelord faded and was replaced with the blue flames that came from Ink's infamous terrorbird. The druid wasted no time in climbing up on the giant bird's back and pulled Cally up. Unfortunatly the delay in their moving away from conflict allowed the spirits to get close enough to attack and ink had to make the bird attack the undead warriors with it's powerful legs. Soon Cally was ready to leave and the bird dashed off, but not before the spirits attacking them got ghost bows from somewhere and were now shooting at the operatives.

"Shit!" Ink cursed and made the bird start weaving around the forest's trees. The arrows were flying right past the operatives head's and things were getting to close for comfort. Cally had activated her hawk eyes and was directing the driud and his familar through the dark, but things were still proving to be difficult as the bird was caught stumbling over dead roots here and there.

"There! I can see the way out! Dodge right and go!" The blonde yelled and Ink complied to every word, dodging the tree they were headed for and spurring on the bird to go faster. Soon the dark and trees were gone, and a mild light greeted the pair.

(...)

"HA HA! We made it!" Ink said, throwing his fists in the air as the bird the duo was riding skwawked happily. Cally glanced behind them for a second to see if anybody was still chasing them, and was relivied to see there wasn't anyONE or anyTHING hot on their tail. The bird began slowing back to a trotting pace and soon Ink was playing leader; which was where he mocked Locrusilas' voice and barked orders with a drunken slur, and told his partner to get Loc on the handorb because 'he was to liquored up to do it'. She laughed at the man's antic's but did as he asked and pulled his handorb out of his pocket, seeing as she still didn't have one of the handy little devices. She channeled the little amount of magic needed into the gem and soon the dark skinned leader's greeting came through the orb.

_'...hello?' _The man said, but instead of a joyus response he got a sobbed stricken voice.

"Loc...*sob*...W-We have a...situation." Cally spoke back.

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Locrusilas sat on the small cot Aberaii had been laying on minutes earlier. She was still on the small makeshift bed, but she was sitting up. The potion Alem had stirred up brought the mage out of whatever stupor she had been in, but either something that caused the brunette's blackout or the potion itself didn't agree with Aberaii who was empting her stomach into a trash can. Her fiance sat by her doing whatever he could to ease the sickness up a bit, however nothing much worked.

Before long Aberaii was back up on her feet. Locrusilas explained the situation one more time to the mage, causing her to remember a dream that she had while unconsious.

"This shadow thing attacked me, and then it started talking. something about me being the last of the Zadderanians or something." the brunette said.

"I remember reading about them once." Desma spoke. "They were an ancient clan that lived deep within the desert, but were spread all over Glienor when people found out about their abilities. From there they served as foreseer's for their kingdom." He finished and Aberaii started talking right after him.

"The shadow said something about foresight. But that's not the point, what I saw after the shadow thing was what got me the most." The mage began. "First there were these creatures that turned into people...then a sword...a massive war...Oh! there was someone stealing the sword as well. Some creatures tried to stop him, but he blew them all away with the sword's power..." she trailed off.

"...Was there anything else?" Locrusilas asked, brow furred in throught.

"I...I don't thi-Wait!" Aberaii responded. "There was something after that...there were these three silouette's on an icy hill. They looked pretty battered and beaten, and then they turned around and-" She was cut off by a loud ringing through out the room. The dark haired leader motioned for Aberaii to hold on for a moment and answered his handorb.

"...Hello?" He spoke into the gem. Cally's voice came back through the other end.

"Loc...*sob*...W-We have a major situation over here..." she said and the leader was immeadiatly at his feet.

"What!? What happened?" he yelled into the magical device. the action caused the other operatives in the room to snap to their feet and ready themselves for the worst.

"We...we were on a terror bird Kin summoned *sob* and we had just got away from the ghosts when he handed me his Handorb...Then we crashed and when I looked up Ink had two arrow's sticking out of his chest! I'm not sure, but i think we're surrounded...I don't know if-"

*Click* was the noise that was made from the small jewel.

"Hello?!" Locrusilas yelled at the hand orb. "HELLO?!" he tried again but to no avail.

"FUCK!" The dark skinned man yelled and pocketed the gem. He snatched his sword from where it rested on the floor and dashed off out the door; Alem, Desma, and Aberaii hot on his heels.

(...)

The group had a fairly decent run ahead of them, and normally a guild operative would have no trouble in clearing the distance between the shack and their comrades location, but Locrusilas and Aberaii were far from rested. Even still, they ran for their partners, and soon they had come upon a few ghosts. Alem and Desma so kindly offered to take care of the enemies, and quickly dispached the deadly specters. Without a word, the group was off again to help their possibly dead friends. they didn't have to go far horever, as they soon came upon an unconsious druid and a heavily bleeding archer staring off at unknown places, occasionally wobbling one way or the other.

Locrusilas ran over to the upturned ink to discover his normally white hoodie stained with blood and two arrows embedded right above the center of his chest. Cally limped over to where he was and the dark man looked up to find she had a total of nine arrows stuck in her; three in the left shoulder, one in one thigh, one in her back, one in her stomach, and two in her arm. She openened her mouth to say something, but began falling backwards instead of speaking.

Locrusilas dashed forward to catch the blonde girl so the arrows wouldn't find a reason to break off or dig themselves deeper when she hit the ground. The dark man looked behind him for a moment to see where his team had gone off to, and was relieved to find the trio, mainly Aberaii, already attending to Ink. The mage was currently determining how deep the arrow had gone in, and judging from the way her eyes widened and she began casting healing magics; the results weren't to pleasing. Things were NOT looking too well here, and once again Loc questioned if he had made the wrong decision while leading his team. He didn't have too long to reflect on that, however, as he felt a biting pain in his calf and looked down just in time to see an arrow literally materalize in his leg. He grunted from the pain, and the exhaustion immeadiatly caught up to him; causing him to nearly fall over. Desma and Alem imeadiatly noticed what happened and in seconds had their weapons at the ready. Locrusilas glanced up and caught sight of at least twenty pairs of glowing ice blue eyes.

"We've gotta get outta here, Loc!" the hammer wielding man yelled and locrusilas nodded. Aberaii moved away from Ink, pleased with the job she had done; having removed the arrows and applied healing magic quickly enough to avoid causing more damage. The mage then stepped over to Cally and took her off of her leader's hands, allowing him to reach down and yank the arrow out of his leg. the action caused another yelp of pain, but at least now he was a little more free to fight. He drew his sword and called out to his other two partners.

"Move ink over here, and then we're gonna set up a barrier of sorts while Aberaii heals Cally enough so we can safely get her outta here." the dark man said, leaving no room for arguement. The two complied, quickly picking ink up and moving him over next to Aberaii; after which the two formed a small circle around the two wounded and the mage. Speaking of whom, Aberaii managed to remove the arrow from Cally's back and used more magic to heal the wound. now having a safe way to lay the girl down, she began performing the same process to each of the other eight arrows. The strain was becoming evident, and the mage was shaking while trying to remove the last couple of arrows. Finally, they were out, and the mage looked up to Locrusilas.

"There...all done...Let's go." she said, panting from all the energy she used. the snow haired man nodded and was about to reply, but a new voice resonated through out the dark area.

_"You are not going anywhere, Zadderanian"_ something hissed, causing the four to visibly tense. Aberaii yelled out in pain, pressing her hands to her head as she crumpled down to the ground. All of the sudden a red robed man appeared in front of them. Desma took no time in running forward and trying to smash the unknown man with his weapon, but the robed man put his hand up; catching the hammer and throwing the man using his own momentum. Alem was next to attack, making her blade glow and running forward with her sword raised. The red stranger readied himself to either block or dodge the attack, and Alem swung at the man even with a good five feet of distance. the robed man saw through her attack however, and instead of the air slicing him like it should have, it missed and he jumped bringing his heel down on the back of the blue haired woman's head in the blink of an eye. She stumbled a bit before falling forward on her face, but was up soon enough; albeit wobbley. Desma had made his way back to his partners side and the two planned for a united front.

Locrusilas was now fixed with a conundrum. Does he abandon three injured teammates to help his other two in a downhill fight, or abandon combat all together and escape with his three teammates in tow? As he watched the battle continue on, quite horribly for the two freelancing operatives one might add, his guild instincts kicked back in full gear and an idea instantly formulated itself in his head.

"Alem! Desma!" the snow haired man yelled out as he ran forward with his sword poised for a strike at the mysterious man. "Go cover the others while I get this guy!" he commanded and the two wasted no time in exiting the fight. The dark robed man did not give chase, favoring to observe the new opponent presented to him. a smirk flash across his face and he fixed his robes as he spoke.

"_We sense you have a deep connection with the Zadderanian._" his raspy voice hissed.

"Who are you and what do you want?" Loc said slowly. Truthfully he couldn't care less if he tried, but he had to buy enough time for Alem to get to work with the potions. once everyone was healed and ready, it would then become a choice of fight or flight, but until then...

"_It does not matter who we are, but we would enjoy it if you allowed us to have that girl...Aberaii we do believe her name is._" the man calmly stated.

"What do you want with her?" Loc immeadiatly questioned. The point of stalling was off of his mind completely, and if this old dick made one more remark about taking his fiancee he was gonna punch him in the face. A dry chuckle was heard and the robed man spoke.

"_If we tell you, will you hand her ov_-" He was cut short as he bent back to avoid the very pointy end of a very pointy sword, namely Locrusilas' sword. Not wanting to give the robed man time to retaliate he swung the sword down attempting to slice the man in two. His target weaved to the left, and Locrusilas was already on the offensive again. The snow haired man swung his foot wide, barely missing the man, but used his leg's momentum to swing himself around for another swing of his sword. The robed man jumped back and Locrusilas already had fireballs at the ready and flying at the man. Again he dodged but jumped right into Locrusilas' area of attack and before he could react a sword swung out, attempting to sever his head. As a matter of fact the sword made connection with something...then stopped instead of cleaving all the way through. Upon a second look, the robed man had caught the crimson sword in one hand, and was now holding up his other with his finger extended, which soon began glowing a deep dark red.

Locrusilas tried to pry away his sword, but it was stuck. He couldn't let go of the handle either for some reason, and the robed man's finger was approaching his neck. The warrior could feel immense heat radiating from the finger, and again he struggled to get away from the man but nothing worked. He could hear the strange man begining to snicker, but was soon replaced with a grunt as a white figure sent the man skidding back a ways. Locrusilas was instantly free from whatever was holding him, and was about to rush the man again but the same white figure, who the dark man recognized as a healed but still bloody Ink, grabbed his arm and jerked him towards the direction of his other teammates. The two left the fight as they ran back to the the rest of the group, all of which was awake albeit tired as hell and weary. Ink wasted no time in taking locrusilas' handorb from his shirt pocket and contacting someone. the two cleared the small distance to the group and Alem, Desma, and now Locrusilas created a 'wall' between the group and the robed man, who was simply standing in the distance.

"Hey...I need that favor you owe me now...wilderness...right now." Ink said as someone picked up on the other end. Locrusilas turned back just in time to catch the device and within seconds a bright light began glowing around the six operatives

"What the hell is happening?" Desma exclaimed.

"I called a friend for a fav-" he was interuppeted by someone shouting out.

"_FIRE!_" was heard as robed man in the distance had hollered out the order for the ghosts to attack, and no later than that arrows from all directions were closing in on them.

"OH SH-" Desma was about to yell but was cut off as the light flashed brighter and soon the six were whisked away.


	16. if it's too hot in the kitchen

Chapter 16: If it's too hot in the kitchen...

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"-IT!!!" Desma finished yelling. He waited for the pain of the arrows, but when nothing happened he opened his eyes and looked around. Everybody was now inside what appeared to be a rather large kitchen.

"Where are we?" the spiky haired man asked.

"Zat would be my kitchen." a voice answered back. All eyes snapped to the kitchen's doors as the opened up, allowing an angry looking chef to come strolling in, blue boots clomping on the floor as he strided up to the druid of the group.

"Kin Sokat, what eez zees? Zees many people cannot find enjoyment in the company of one such az yourself. I waz wondering why ze teleport waz harder than usu-al." the poofy hatted man said to Ink, who immeadiatly snapped at the chef.

"WHAT THE HELL, MAN!?" The neighbor hood druid yelled. "A second later and we would have been pincushions! And drop the God damned accent, everyone knows you're not Phasmatan." At this the bloody man folded his arms and turned his nose up. His smugness didn't last long, however, as he was soon out on the ground from a frying pan injury.

"I like the accent, thank you very much" The chef said as he set the frying pan back on the stove. His attention was then turned to the unconsious forms of Cally and Aberaii, both of whom were, unfortunatly, laying on the ground

"Good god what happened to that one?" he asked as he motioned to the red archer.

"We wandered too far into the wilderness and bad shit happened, enough said." Locrusilas stated. He knew who this man was, who he descended from, exactly what he could do. Thinking back, the dark man was once hired by the guild to out this very same man out of commision. There was absolutely no trust to be had at the moment for the man in an apron.

"...and this one?" the chef inqured about Aberaii. Again, Locrusilas responded.

"To be honest, I don't exactly know. This is the second time it's happened though. I think she's honestly just exhausted." he answered back and the chef nodded his head.

The cook walked over to a cupboard, pulled a small bag from a shelf and walked over to Aberaii, picking her picked her head up and waved the bag under her nose. The mage's eyes snapped open and she quickly fell into a sneazing fit.

"What the hell did you do?" Locrusilas said, taking a step foward as his fist clenched at his side

"Relax, _leader_" the chef said not even looking at the dark man. "I just used some smelling salts...of my own variety. just a strong spice really." the chef finished as he left Aberaii and walked over to ink and did the same thing; the druid also began sneazing like no tomorrow, however due to his throbbing head, his sneazes only induced more pain. This caused the chef himself to fall into a laughing frenzy, hysterically "losing it" at the sight of the two.

"What about cally?" Alem asked the chef. "Aren't you gonna wake her up too?"

"No. To be truthful, I don't think sneazing her head off would be the best thing for the girl at the moment. however, if you take this door and go right, you'll find some stairs that lead to the guest beds here." he replied. by this time, the two operatives had stopped sneazing,

so the chef got Ink's attention by gripping his shoulder.

"so what happened you Kin? why'd you call me right in the middle of rush hour work? why're you and your teammates injured?" the chef spoke up again, asking Ink every question he could think of

"well if you'd shut up for a minute, i'll tell you...just no more frying pan. Now, we were going to the duel arena..."

And ink began explaining the hell of a day he and his squad had.

(...)

"Damn." said the chef. "I'm glad I quit guild work when I did."

"Wait, you used to be in a guild?" Aberaii said in surprise...it's just that a cook didn't look like a fighting type.

"not just any guild, i used to be in THE guild...if you don't know then don't worry about it, I'm sure you'll be able to weasel some information out of one of your friends here." The chef replied to the mage.

"...You look really familar...What's your name." Alem said from across the room. The chef turned to answer her.

"Ah! my apologies! My name is-" began.

"Ranetuz Jamboli." a femine voice finished for the cook, who slapped his hand over his mouth as if the noise originated from him. All eyes were turned to see cally standing by the door as if waiting for a red carpet, but looking more battered than anything else.

"Cally! you're up and awake!" the chef said as he walked up to her and gripped her in a bone crushing hug. this left everyone else rather stupified, except for ink, who was feeling slighty pissed at his 'chefy' friend. The driud's fuse was growing ever so short, and if the cook didn't step away from his archer then there'd be hell...

"how're you doing, brother?" the blonde girl said to the chef as he set her down. If people were befuddled before, they were in oz land now. A glance over from the Archer allowed her to fix her mistake upon seeing everyone's faces.

"I've...uhh...got some explaing to do, huh?" nods. "figured." the archer said.

"look, were not related, but we do both come from lumbridge. when we were kids we saw each other around the castle often enough to talk...i think the last time I saw him was when i was, like, sixteen. Something about his dad." She trailed off and Loc's impatience finally got the better of him.

"I don't aim to be out of line here, but we have important business to attend to in about twenty-six hours, and i think everyone here is gonna be asleep for twenty of those hours. so if you could just tell us where we are..." Locrusilas asked/demanded from the chef.

"Catherby." the chef simply said, again not bothering to look a locrusilas.

"We can't leave yet Loc! This is my first time seeing my brother in ages!" Cally exclaimed. The dark skinned leader made to say something but Ranetuz interupted him.

"How far is your base?" the chef asked Locrusilas.

"Just out of Ardougne, why-" The man began but was cut short yet again.

"Great! Just let me grab a few things and i'll come with you!" Ranetuz said and ran off, leaving a total of five people totally bewildered-and one bouncing off of the walls with glee. Ink walked up to Locrusilas and gave him a look, one that clearly showed understanding of the dislike of Ranetuz. The taller man began sobbing lightly, ink joining in seconds later. Alem walked up to the two and cracked them on the head.

"Get a grip guys, he's just an overly annoying chef..." at this point the blue haired woman trailed off due to the glares she was reciving from the duo.

"Just...a...chef?" they both said at the same time.

"Oh no." the dark man began alone. he went to say something else, but instead he stared at the woman for a moment, as if finding the right way to put something.

"i'll bet you probably havn't noticed your missing earrings." the leader said. instantly the blue woman's hand was up to her ear, fumbling around for something that clearly wasn't there.

"He-What the fuck!" she screamed out after a moment, awaking Desma from his vegetable like state in the corner and turning him into a scared little kitten. He knew full well the power of a pissed off Alem.

"Now pair that up with a better-than-average guild operative's abilites, and what do you have?" Loc asked the seething woman. the question was purely hypothetical, but she answered him nontheless.

"A dick!" she said and stomped off, threats of murder and torture bieng mumbled as she slumped down next to her barbarian companion...who scooted away an inch or two. The door opened to reveal a chef who walked in happy as a clam. Ink and Locrusilas exchanged a look, both knowing exaclty what was about to happen.

"OK! We can go now! I got ever-" Ranetuz began but was cut off by a flying blue woman.

"YOU SON OF A BITCH! GIMME MY EARRINGS!" Alem screamed as she lunged at the cook, who had retrieved a light blue chef's knife from behind him and blocked the incoming scimtar blade. no sooner than the clash of the blades rang out, Ranetuz gripped Alem's arm and sent a magic shock through the armor, effectively disabling the woman and sending her to the ground. Everyone was up on their feet, ready to stop the small tiff from going any further, but it looked like it was over already. the chef reached into the pocket of his black pants and pulled out two sapphire earrings, tossing them on the ground.

"I was going to give them back...they're not what i need anyway." he said quietly to her and then stepped over her, walking into the middle of the room.

"Well! we had better get going, no?" the cook said, mixing accents for a moment. he knew everyone was eyeing him suspiciously, but he didn't care...he was used to it.

"Y...yeah, lets go..." Ink said, looking around the room as Desma helped Alem up.

"Then were off!" the chef said and walked out the door.

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short chapter i know, but the next one is actually gonna be introducing our new friend. Can he be trusted? Is he a good natured soul? or possibly an evil Chefyroth- haha get it? sephiroth, chefyroth? you might not if you havn't heard of final fantasy . also i apologize for going missing for like, ever. you know i love you guys...maybe.


	17. I Wish The Sun Hadn't Risen

very short chapter, i know, but this addresses an important part...pay attention.

Chapter 17: I Wish The Sun Hadn't Risen...

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As the seven Guild operatives set out for Sector fifty-eight's home base in Ardougne, which involved heading north from Catherby; a small fishing town, into the Seer's village and west from there, they discovered that the sun had still not set, but it was getting ready to. Probably just enough time to make the small walk and reach the destination before nightfall.

Maybe it was the stress that began building up that day, but Locrusilas' team figured there was no way they'd be able to return to base, rest, and still be able to make it to the guild chief.

'Man was the chief gonna get one hell of a report.' Locrusilas said to himself. 'I wonder if Alem and Desma heard from the old man yet...' And on that note, he turned to look back at the small team in his company. Again, he felt the need to reflect on his life. From shit, living diseased in falador, to shine was the easiest way to put it...well, today wasn't exactly one of the best days, but 'whatever' he thought.

'At least we're all still alive.' Locrusilas thought. Sure, he made bad choices at times, but so far almost everyone who raised a weapon alongside him was taken care of so long as he had the power.

'Speaking of power...When did Ink learn that new technique? I remember Cally describing something once...' he trailed off, lost in thought. '...She said something about fur, but that's about all i remember. looks like we're gonna have to have a small meeting before we go see chiefy. GOD I hate not knowing what other people have planned! At least let me know you're doing something! How am i suppos-' He was cut off from thought when someone snapped their fingers in front of his face.

"Loc. I'm fucking tired. Open the gate." Ink said. Seemed he was losing the abilty to form co-herent sentences due to lack of sleep. Being completly honest, that shocked the leader a little bit. There have been times the druid had gone at least two days without sleep, and still had the ability to take down ten rouge knights...thats without the familar mind you. The kills were sloppy and the injuries were plenty, but the job was done.

The dark skinned leader finally found the key to the gate that surrounded the base, and the seven operatives walked the path to the house.

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"Good GOD!" Said Ink as he kicked open the door to his room, Cally not too far behind him. Both were exhausted from nearly a whole day of fighting. "Last time i ever decide to go anywhere...And now we gotta leave, AGAIN, in twenty two hours to go see the chief in burthope." the druid finished, plopping himself down on the bed. Thinking back, that ghost mission was probably one of the hardest missions he'd ever been on. Not that he could remember much due to having passed out from two arrows straight to the chest.

'Right about number five or six on the list, i'd say' he thought with a mental smile.

Then he got to meet his old friend ranetuz...well, old aquaintance. They met in a jail cell once and helped each other break out, but ranetuz almost got caught so ink had to double back and save the chef; thus earning him the favor. Now, however, That same chef was in the same house ink, visiting with his sister and 'good buddy' as he put it once. Good thing the Chef got drunk fairly quickly and passed out, or he never would have shut up! The walk itself from Catherby to Ardougne only lasted an hour at best, and Ranetuz had kept all the tired operatives awake by yakking his head off for the past three hours; talking nonsense of finding a new job and whatnot. Ink would have left earlier, but Cally kinda made him stay... speaking of blonde archers, what the hell was the one in ink's room doing?

For the past couple of minutes the blonde had been going through dresser drawers like mad, pulling somethings out as she searched. eventaully, she stopped her search and made for the connected bathroom.

"What're you doing" Ink questioned lazily. The sound causes Cally to look over at the druid.

"Taking a shower..." Said the blonde with a sly smile on her face. Even though she had been shot, kicked, hit, and blasted with magic almost all day, she found she still had the energy to do some extra-curricular activities with the druid.

'It has to be the ears' she decided in her head and waited for Kin to take the bait.

"And you're smiling because...?" He asked, but the only reply he got was a towel tossed in his face. Once the man recovered from the attack and pulled the cloth of doom away from him, he looked around, noting that his 'attacker' had disappeared. The sound of running water was heard, and Ink's attention was turn to the bathroom door, which was only partially closed; a rather wide gap between the door and the wall.

The bunny man looked at the towel, then the bed, then the door again as he cycled through his list of available options. A battle was being fought in his head as to whether he should go to sleep or get-*ahem*-clean. Ink took another look at the bed before bolting up without warning and making a mad dash for the bathroom, but not before heading to his room's door and locking it.

"Yeah...I never lust after women. Who was I fooling" He said with a grin as he slipped into the bathroom.

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There were only a few things that calmed down Locrusilas better than a nice, cold beer. One of those things would have to be the massages that Aberaii gave at night. Sitting behind Loc on the edge of the bed, she would apply just a bit of magic to her fingertips and then force that magic into locrusilas' muscles. From there the magic would lie in wait for all of about ten seconds or so, then 'detonate', spreading a light amount of healing magic throught the dark warrior's back, the sensation similar to warm blanket on a cold day. Relaxing, that was for damn sure.

"You're really knotted tonight, hun." Aberaii said as she worked the knots with her fingers, applying more magic. The action earned a grateful sigh and a response from the man.

"Well, it's pretty easy to see why..." Commented Loc, another sigh escaping when the mage moved to his shoulders. The leader leaned back into the sand colored woman, allowing her to work a little easier.

"Well, not everything went wrong. We did learn a lot today." The mage replied. This caused Locrusilas to sit up again and look at her.

"That reminds me...Earlier, at that hut with Alem and Desma, You said you had another vision in the wilderness?" The snow haired man asked and Aberaii nodded.

"Yeah, it's been playing in my mind over and over. I can't seem to make any connections as to what it might mean." Aberaii shook her head lightly at the end. When she looked up, Locrusilas had that 'tell me more' look in his eye and the brunette began describing her last vision.

"Well, like I said, it was night out on a snowy hill...I think I saw a cave in the background, I'm not sure. Anyway, three figures were on this hill, but they were blacked out due to the night. I was a little upset at that, because they were doing something...at least the one in the middle was. He was knelt down on the ground, adjusting something. I thought that was gonna be the ending of it, but I guess not because the sun began to rise...I really wish the sun hadn't risen..." Aberaii paused for a moment, staring at nothing. Locrusilas asked if she was alright, and she nodded, picking back up where she left off.

"Finally it got bright enough to see the people, and believe it or not, it was us..." Again she paused.

"Us? As in the four of us? But you said there was three..." Locrusilas asked, confused as to where his receptionist was going with this.

"Yes, three...Myself, you, and Cally." Aberaii replied. The confusion was still evident on the dark man's face, until a brief idea of what she was getting at crossed through his mind.

"wait...You don't mean to say..." Loc asked, disbelief now taking over where confusion once was.

"Well, that's just it...I've never seen this place before in my life, and you know exactly how many places i've been." she said and loc nodded his agreement.

"That, along with the fact that I have no idea what we would even be doing there...All I have to go off of is that we all looked pretty battered and beaten...seriously beaten." The woman grimaced upon remembering what they looked like in the vision. Locrusilas sat there for a moment, letting all of the information sink in and add up with each other.

'Desma said Aberaii's ancestors were used as foreseers for kingdoms...meaning they must have been pretty accurate in their visions...and Ink HAS been getting more reckless...Ink...Are you leaving us?' the dark man asked in his head before opening his mouth to say something to Aberaii.

"I really wish the sun hadn't risen..." The dark man said quietly before getting up and heading to his office. He needed a strong drink right now, Along with a way to figure out how to stop something he had no idea about.

"Me too, Loc." Aberaii whispered to herself as she laid back in the large bed. Maybe sleep would straighten out some more things...and kill a little of the guilt from not telling Locrusilas everything.

_'You didn't make it off either..._' Was the last recognizable thought in the mage's head before exhaustion took over.

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oooooooooooooooooooooooh snap! check that out! visions are a bitch, huh? The bad part is, aberaii is the only one who know's what might happen! will she spill the beans to loc and ink? or will she wait it out? HA! you're gonna have to find out on you're own.


	18. First Example

Chapter 18:

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_'W-where am I?'_ Aberaii asked herself as she looked around. The last thing she remembered was falling asleep in a nice, warm bed...so now why was she in an icy cave?

_The sounds of battle dragged her out of her thoughts as she turned around to see four people fighting against a cloaked person wielding a rather large sword...or at least...they were. It seemed the five had stopped fighting momentarily in favor of questioning. Eventually, one of the figures stepped forward and got a little louder, the anger fairly evident in his voice._

_"...If it's the last thing I do!" And with that, the four had begun attacking again, effectively driving the man back closer to the cave walls. The massive sword he had couldn't defend against all of his attackers at the same time, and for a while it seemed the four would surely be the survivors of this struggle. _

_But then an ominous yet holy silver glow surrounded the sword, lighting up the cavern a little bit more and revealing a little bit more about the people Aberaii was watching. As the sword began to glow brighter, the four's attacks began to rain down faster and harder. A man in a white chestplate ran at the cloaked man, bringing the large battle axe he had down in an attempt to cut the enemy in half._

'_Oh god...Don't tell me...' the mage thought as she looked down at her hand. Sure enough, it was transparent; a sign that she was currently experiencing a vision._

_The cloaked man brought the large sword up, blocking the axe, and then delived a powerful boot to the axe wielder chest. immeadiatly after that, the cloaked man was off, arrows that discharged electricity just barely missing him. His path was soon cut off by a larger man with a massive blade of his own, this one just didn't look as decorative. the two began trading blow for blow, when the large man teleported and reappeared behind the cloaked man. his blade was blocked again, and again he teleported to another side, attempting for another slice. again, it was blocked, and AGAIN the large man teleported, this time relocating himself away from cloaked man and literally a second later projectiles and magic of every sort was flying at him. the cloaked man had just enough time to draw an unfamilar symbol in the air before the attacks hit and created a large explosion_.

'_Is this before or after sunrise?' _Aberaii questioned, turning her attention back to the encounter.

_The smoke cleared, and sure as hell, there was the cloaked man inside a small barrier with out so much as a scratch. Immeadiatly more arrows and magic was fired at him as the two warriors from before ran up towards the enemy. The archer began closing in as she fired more electric arrows, these humming as they flew. The mage sat opposite of her, launching any magic that surfaced in her mind. Combined with the other two leading an up-close assault, it looked like everything was done and getting ready to be wrapped up. a swing of the massive sword the cloaked man possesed, however, sent the light it had been building up all this time scattering to every part of the cavern._

_"...Enough!" was all Aberaii was able to make out before the light began to glow brighter still and it's color began to change from silver to red. Suddenly every nerve inside the brunette's body was lit on fire as her astral image collapsed, but forced her to watch the events unfold. In the distance, she could see and hear the four from before yelling as they felt probably ten times what she felt now. All she could think about was the pain. She tried calming herself and maybe escaping the vision, but the pain flared two-fold and again, that's all she could think of. Time didn't have a factor anymore._

_Seconds? Minutes? Hours? She wasn't sure anymore. All she knew is she hurt. bad._

_Finally the pain began to die down, but Aberaii couldn't find the energy to move at the moment. No, she wouldn't find the energy to move until..._

_*__**Shlink**__*_

_The sound of flesh giving way to steel was sounded throughout the cave, followed by another scream, then laughter._

_Pushing herself off the cold ground, Aberaii forced her head to turn up and bear witness to the scene she had been dreading for awhile now. _

_There, impaled by the cloaked man's massive sword, was a figure in white with black pants. He was still alive, however, as evident by the way he watched the cloaked man bring his free hand up; which soon began glowing as if it were covered in fire. _

_Aberaii, along with everyone else in the cave, watched with horror as the cloaked man ripped the sword out of the white figure's midsection, earning another pained half yell from the man, and the raised the glowing hand towards the familar person. Another fit of evil laughter, and then he fired a large blast. Light and yells of pain filled the cave yet again, but this time they only last for about five seconds...then...nothing. _

_No more light._

_No more pain._

_Not even a body left behind. _

_Aberaii watched as the large man from earlier struggled to get back on his feet using his sword as a makeshift crutch. The cloaked man noticed this and began walking in the larger man's direction. Upon reaching his destination, the cloaked man simply pushed the larger man backwards, getting right in his face afterward. _

_The brunette mage could tell SOMETHING was being said...but again...she was too far away to hear properly. The cloaked man's mouth stopped moving, as if he were listening to someone, and, without warning, hauled his fist back and began raining down blow after blow on the large, injured man. When one arm got tired, the other would take over. Eventually, the enemy stepped away from whatever person he had just used for a human punching bag, and said one last thing before turning and walking out of the cave, leaving the four...well, three others, remaining..._

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"AAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!" Yelled aberaii as she shot up from the bed, grabbing at her head as it throbbed. The sound of boots meeting the wooden floorboards was heard before the door to Locrusilas' room was opened with force, slamming against the wall. Immeadiatly the dark leader in front of Aberaii, trying to snap the mage out of whatever daze she was in.

"Hey! HEY! Aberaii!" Loc repeated over and over, lightly shaking the girl. Bit by bit, the brunette willed herself to stop shaking and looked over at Locrusilas. Behind him, on the other side of the large room, was the doorway and in that doorway sat a ghost by the name of Kin Sokat...or was he still alive? She didn't know right now.

"Did you have another vision?" the dark man asked, to which the mage nodded.

"Yeah, but it was just a...different view of the same thing." She half lied. While it was true that it was the same thing, she definatly didn't SEE anyone die the first time.

"anything you wanna talk about?" Locrusilas questioned. Before Aberaii could respond, however, Ink threw his hands up at the doorway.

"Didn't she say it was the same thing? I mean, how many times you wanna hear 'bout me dying?" Ink asked sarcastically from the doorway. "now come on, we still got stuff to get ready before meeting with the chief." At that last bit, he held up a folder with a large stack of papers in it. "Which, might I add, is in Three hours so if you don't mind..." He finally finished, tapping his foot with impatience.

"I take it you told him?" Aberaii asked quietly. Loc responded with a quick "Had to" before exiting quickly with Ink, leaving Aberaii by herself once again. At least she felt a wee bit better, seeing Ink and Loc proved that they wern't dead...

"...yet." Aberaii added, depressing her even farther.

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Ranetuz was running. Mainly because that damned thing was chasing him again! The first time this happened The chef had used Desma for a human shield, which was something the big man wasn't to fond of, but now the barbarian and his aqua haired partner were gone; Leaving Ranetuz to fend for himself.

This was the third time he'd been spotted by the beast and it's mistress, but he'd never give into the demands she was yelling as the two chased him. It was just impossible for him to do.

Why didn't he fight back? well, attacks were futile against the two. so he had no choice but to run. The beast made it's inhuman sound again, spurring the chef further down the hallway. A quick right and...

"Shit! Dead end!" the chef yelled as he came two an abrubt stop. This was it. He was done for sure, lest he give into demands. Ranetuz heard the beast growl, and he turned around, immeadiatly greeted by the monster and it's owner. Ranetuz fell to his knees in defeat as the two approached him.

"Will you do as i ask?" The red woman demanded more than asked as her white monster began moving in for the kill.

Ranetuz looked up, meeting the woman's gaze as he spoke.

"...Never." He spat.

"Then suffer!" The woman yelled and the beast lunged, mouth open wide as it approached with intense velocity. It collided with the chef, and sent him to the ground, immeadiatly attacking him with...

Licks.

"AAAARRRGHHHH!! Get zeez mutt off me!" Ranetuz yelled out as the saliva monster kept on licking him. The red woman walked over to the scene of the attack.

"Then you'll do what I asked?" the woman asked, stifling laughter.

"Yes! ANYTHING! Just get this dog off of me! C'mon Cally! you know I hate dogs!" he began pleading before Cally walked overand picked the small dog up.

"Good! I'll let Loc know to pencil this occasion in!" She said as she bounded away with the dog in her arms.

"You know you can be a real bitch sometimes!" He yelled, then immeadiatly regretted as the blonde set the dog down again.

"Get 'im Kane!" She yelled.

*Yap Yap Yap*

"NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!" The chef had enough time to yell before the puppy landed on him one last time.

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*knock knock*

"Come in!" Loc yelled out. The door opened, and in came Cally. Ink waved after taking another drag of his cigarette, going back to work immeadiatly.

"What are you guys doing?" She asked after watching the two copy papers and then file them away.

"Someone spilled vodka all over these files...so now we're trying to recopy some of the important documents." The leader said and Cally chose to become interested in some of the papers.

"Need help? I'm a quick writer." The blonde said, taking a seat at the desk. Loc gave her a small stack of papers and a pen, and then another stack of blank papers.

"Get writing." he said, going straight back to writing. Cally started writing, speeding through copy after copy.

"Was something wrong with Aberaii earlier?" the archer asked after a moment. Locrusilas nodded.

"Yeah, it was just another vision. She's fine now, and she actually came down here earlier...I'm shocked you missed her." He said.

"But she's fine now, right?" Cally asked again. Locrusilas nodded his agreement and Cally stood up, handing the newly copied papers to Locrusilas. She gave a thanks and bolted out the door.

"...Fuck..." Ink said, slouching over.

"What?" Loc questioned, glancing up from his papers.

"I wrote down everything you guys said..." The druid admitted.

"Dammit, Ink!" Loc yelled, throwing his pen and a large stack of papers at the bunny man.

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Cally approached Loc and Aberaii's that lay at the end of the hallway. upon reaching her destination, she lifted her hand and knocked, waiting for someone to acknowledge she was at the door. Again another knock, this time a little louder.

"Come in!" was heard quietly from behind the door, so Cally allowed herself into the room.

"Hello?" the blonde called out, quickly recieving a response.

"Hold on, Hold on..." Someone said. It appeared Locrusilas had an attached bathroom as well, as it opened up; revealing a towel clad Aberaii.

"Uh..." Cally...kind of asked. She had no reason to be weirded out, as she was seeing nothing new, but still...

"Did you need something?" The mage asked as she stepped out of the bathroom and walked over to the bed, clothes in hand.

"Um...yeah, actually. You remember when I asked you to teach me a little bit about magic?" Cally answered with her own question, to which Aberaii nodded. "Well, i was thinking, and it seems you specialize in more defensive magics?" Again, a nod from the mage. "Well, I kind of figured that maybe you could teach me those, and i'm currently forcing Ranetuz to teach me offensive magics..." Cally trailed off at the end.

"Ranetuz? Why not Loc, or me for that matter? i mean, no offense or anything, but he doesn't look like he knows too much about magic..." The mage said.

"From what i hear, he teleported us out of the wilderness." Cally shot back and Aberaii could only agree.

"true...Ok, i've got no problem with it if you don't." She said smiling. Cally couldn't help but smile back.

"Alright then-" Aberaii said as she stood up. "-it's time for your first lesson in magic...Gear." At this Cally turned her head to the side in confusion, causing the mage to continue.

"Robes, hat, wands, staves, runes, the like." She said and the archer nodded her understanding. Aberaii picked up her blue robe top, and handed it to Cally.

"Feel how its very soft and smooth? Those are magical fibers; They allow magic to flow a little bit easier., and make it a hell of a lot easier to expel magical energies, or attack...with magic of course. Wands and staves do the same thing, although they're usually a bit more offensive. I personally don't use them, but i know that certain staves completely negate the need for certain runes...and before you ask about them, you smoke, right?" The mage asked.

"yeah, but I don't know what that has to-" Cally began but was cut off when Aberaii tossed a fire rune her way.

"Light an invisible cigarette." Aberaii said, and Cally 'lit' the rune, the top of it becoming hot. Aberaii nodded and gave her a sign meaning 'enough'. It quickly cooled off, and the fire symbol on the front dissapeared. Aberaii walked over and opened the window, and motioned for Cally to come over. Upon reaching the window, Aberaii gave Cally an air rune, with three white lines representing wind, and a mind rune, with a symbol that resembled a sun.

"Since you say you have no magical training prior to this, i'm assuming you don't know how to control spiritual energy correctly, so i want you to hold these in one hand and aim at the trees." The brunnete commanded, and Cally immeadiatly complied, aiming her closed fist at the trees. "Now, when you do this, there's gonna be a bit of a 'kick', if you will. So once you think you're ready, go ahead and 'light the invisible cigarette'.

Cally waited for a moment, before moving that familar feeling down her arm and into her hand. only this time, a small ball of air of air shot from her fist, following an awkward path before zooming straight into the ground and dissapating.

"For a first shot, that was pretty good. Now i want you to-" The mage was cut off by Loc Yelling from down the hall.

"Aberaii! C'mon! We're Gonna find Cally then we gotta go!" The dark leader called out. Aberaii began collecting her things before ushering Cally out of the room, talking about how they'd continue practice when they got back. Everything was happening very quickly and before Cally knew it she was out in the middle of the hallway.

"...What?" She said to herself. Eventually she began walking towards the Direction Loc's voice came from...

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	19. Familar Paths

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Chapter 19:

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Locrusilas, Kin, Aberaii, and Cally were grouped together with Ranetuz at the front door. The four were practically already gone, having left to see the guild chief, but Loc was having some final issues with leaving the shifty chef in the house alone.

"...And if it looks expensive, don't touch it. Matter of fact, gimmie your hands. I'm taking them until we get back." the Leader said as he began unsheathing the sword.

"Woah Woah WOAH!" Ranetuz said as he began walking backwards, hiding his hand behind him. Aberaii ahemed and Locrusilas looked over. The look on her face told him 'enough shenanigans'. loc sheathed his sword and stepped away from the cook. Kin had calmed down slightly, eyes bloodshot and leaning against the wall. Cally was looking simliar to him, using the wall along with the druid for support. Loc wondered briefly what they had gotten into, but dismissed the thought when he saw Ranetuz trying to creep away from the four. Locrusilas reached out and grabbed the man.

"Oh no...I'm not done with you yet..." Locrusilas said, earning complaints from the group.

(...)

Ten minutes later, The small group was on their way. They didn't have very long way to go, since this time the guild chief was in Burthope. Considering the walk to the Seer's village takes twenty minutes at best, and that's the halfway point.. The only real obstacle was White Wolf Mountain, but that'd be no problem for the company druid.

This walk didn't look to be too time consuming. So, to pass that little time quickly, why not strike up some conversation.

"So, Ink-" Loc said from the front of the group. Ink 'hn'ed, showing that the leader had his attention while he looked at the villages facities, and Loc took it as a sign to continue. "-That stuff you were wearing back at the old base...when we were fighting that goblin...what was his name..."The dark man pondered for a moment, but shook his head, pushing the question aside. "Whatever, it's not important. Anyway, back to the subject; What was up with that stuff." Locrusilas finished, and Kin decided to actually give Loc his full attention...And then two more pairs of eyes were watching him, waiting for an explanation.

"Well, eh...I'd show you, but it takes alot of energy..." The druid said as he scratched an ear through the skull cap. "...So i'll give you the short version...Which would be me-" At this Kin held up his first finger. "-and my Wolf-" Now the middle finger was up with the first. "-fusing...to a point." He finished, and crossed the two fingers he held up. Loc nodded as if he understood, but the way he was looking...Kin was sure he was gonna-

"Can you do it with anything else?" The leader asked, and again three pairs of eyes were on Kin.

"Yes, but the 'better' the familar, the more energy it saps outta me...and to be honest I can only do it with other things in theory." Kin said as he mentally flipped through the pages of his notebook. Loc nodded, seeming satisfied with the explanation.

"You'll have to spar with me then...With that technique of course." The dark warrior said smugly as Kin lit a cigarette, taking a deep drag and speaking after.

"Its called Summoning Armor-" The druid said and exhaled the smoke. "And whenever you wanna go a round or two, i'm ready." Ink finished, flicking the newly formed ashed from the his cigarette. Loc waved as he passed the Seer's village guard, and the four continued on to catherby. There was only a small walk between the two cities.

"Y'know, i still wonder why Ranetuz didn't wanna come back to Catherby. I mean, He DID say he works here, right?" Ink asked.

"He said he felt more...what what was it...easier? At our place." Aberaii replied to the druid.

"That, And he said he'd be helping with my magic." Cally said with a grin on her face.

"Oh, your finally gonna do that, huh?" Ink said after inhaling more toxins.

"Yup. As soon we get back to base, Aberaii and Ranetuz are gonna teach me the real basics." the blonde said back to ink, who was interrupted by the leader before he could even say anything.

"THE CHEF?! How come i wasn't picked?" Locrusilas said slumping his shoulders. Aberaii wrapped him in a hug as they walked.

"Oh, it's ok...besides, your more of our brute strength person. Along with that, we're at the mountain, so there's no time for you to be mopey." the mage said, earning a depressed sigh from Locrusilas, but the leader picked himself back up and began talking.

"Alright, We've finally arrived at white wolf mountain, in case you havn't noticed. So, Ink, you know what to do." The leader said with a wave of his hand. Kin took another hit of his cigarette before flicking it away. The druid then pulled out a wolf pouch and slammed it on the ground, a medium sized white wolf taking its place. The druid and his wolf ran up the side path of the mountain, leaving the other three operatives behind for a moment.

a few seconds later, a howl was heard and Locrusilas handorb started making that familar chime. The leader pulled the gem out and spoke into it.

"Are we good to go?" He said.

_'Yeah, go ahead and come on up.'_ The voice on the other end said. Loc nodded and hung up the jewel, putting it back into his pocket. He then turned around to the women who were totally clueless. Loc read their expressions, noticing they were confused by what the two old friends were doing.

"I'll explain later. For now, follow me." the dark man said, walking up the same path Kin took moments before and motioning for the other two to hurry up.

(...)

After a minute or two of traveling rough mountain terrain, the three caught up with Kin, who was currently sitting on a log enjoying a cancer stick...Surrounded by at least ten wolves who began growling at the three, but Kin made some noise that made them all start wagging. Then he stood up, and got down on one knee after.

"Well, sorry guys-" Ink said to the wolves, who immeadiatly started howling; knowing full well what the man was doing. "-But my other friends need me again. So i'll have to swing back by sometime later." After that, the wolves began trying to move their way in to nuzzle Ink and his wolf, which lasted for about three minutes before the druid stood back up to rejoin the group in finishing the hike. A nod from Locrusilas and the four were headed for burthope once more.

(...)

Kin, Loc, Aberaii, and Cally finally reached the end of the mountains path. it led straight into the souther area of...

"Taverly..." Ink said as he looked around. the group stepped down the rest of the small cliff, and walked into the village. Druids were hustling about, moving this way and that, out of this building and into this one, you get the idea.

"I wonder what all the commotion is about." Loc pondered out loud. of course, nobody answered him, but whatever.

Without another word, the group continued north through the village to burthope.

(...)

The mood immeadiatly lightened when the group saw the little 'Burthope Ahead' signpost. Ink took a deep breath and spoke.

"So, where is this place supposed to be?" The druid said to the leader, who stared at the paper for a moment before answering back.

"Follow me." He commanded in a cool tone and began walking. The operatives followed the small road into the military-esque town, passing up a few run down huts and what appeared to be a pub. The dark warrior led his team around the large castle walls and down an alley before stopping at a large steel door. He dug around in his rune pouch before pulling out 3 pebbles, each of which had a light blue picture of a scale on it. He searched the door for a moment before huffing in frustration.

"Whats the problem." Cally asked from the back of the group.

"Theres no rune lock on the door..." Locrusilas responded. Aberaii walked up to him and took the law runes from him.

"I'm honestly surprised you forgot that trick i tought you, hun. Watch." the brunnette mage said before pressing the runes against the door and concentrating. A few clicks and clunks were heard before a loud clang sounded and the door began opening. Loc grabbed the small girl up off of her feet.

"Ah-Ha! what would I ever do without you?" he said grinning. Ink and Cally began walking past the two before the druid stopped in his tracks.

"You probably would have gotten us all killed at one point or anoth-" He was cut off by the sound of a hand meeting the back of his head.

"Shut it. Keep walking." Loc demanded and Ink began walking forward with his hands up. Cally patted his back before talking.

"It's ok, you'll learn one day." she quiped and the bunny man opened his mouth to say something, but yelped instead when the blondes foot contacted with his shin, effectively stopping him in his tracks for a moment. Cally giggled and continued on through the door, Loc and Aberaii following her; leaving Ink outside. The druid heaved a depressed sigh and muttered something under his breath and made to go through the door with the rest of his team mates when something bumped into his hip and for a split second he saw a child running out of the alley. The animal man cursed before rifling through his pockets...and when his wallet turned up missing he shouted in anger and took off after the kid.

"You little shit!"

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Late, Late, Late, LATE. HOLY FUCKING SHIT LATE!!!!! i apologize. Had a spot of trouble in money and well...yeah.


End file.
